Lloydminister Flyball Tournament

The shelties and I went to a flyball tournament in Lloydminister this past weekend.   Both shelties had full time spots and ran 8 races each day with 3 heats per race.  It was a lot of racing and both Spryte and I gained a lot of experience at this tournament.  Spryte also earned enough points for her FDCH title.

 It was Spryte's second tournament and she improved tremendously from the last one. Our last tournament she kept stopping to watch the other dogs race and she was dropping her ball early and fumbling at the box. This time we hardly had any ball issues (mostly the last races because she was exhausted at that point) and she didn't stop once to watch the other dogs.  Her box turns were beautiful all weekend too.  Even without any props in front of the box she got up and did a four foot turn every time! 

Spryte's speed also improved tremendously at this tournament.  She was so distracted last time that she never really put out any effort to get to the box and back.  Her times were in the high 6's.  In Lloyd on Saturday morning Spryte started out very strong and fast and blew her old times out of the water.  Her fastest time this weekend was a 5.3 and we know she can be faster.  It was nice to see her really trying hard and running fast.  She was excited to play but this time she was better at dealing with her enthusiasm and showed way more self control.  She is improving so much and I'm sure next tournament she will be running consistently in the low 5's and will be catching the ball every time with very few bobbles.

Strider and I ran on an open team at this tournament.  Basically it's a team that is formed just for the one show and it can have dogs from any club on it.  I am on Go All Out and I was racing with people from Northern Power Paws and Rebel Racers.  The team was named "Go Rebel Paws" which I thought was cute and very clever :).  I didn't know any of these people and would be meeting them all for the first time this weekend.  Some people in flyball are a little "hard core" and want to have the fastest times and win all the races. I just go to have fun and put points on my dogs.  I was a little worried that my temporary teammates might take it a little too seriously for me. Well there really wasn't any reason for me to worry.  The people were all very nice and encouraging.  They loved Strider and cheered for him every race.   The team captains mentioned to me in the beginning that they are there to have fun with their dogs and at the end of the tournament they said that I am welcome to race with them anytime, they would love to have Strider and I back. It was a great experience and even though they are not my actual team, I still felt like I was apart of a team when I raced with them.

So all in all it was a very successful weekend. I had a great time playing with my dogs and seeing huge improvements in Spryte.  It was fun meeting new people and experiencing a different team.  And as always I had a great time with my teammates, racing together, chatting about dogs and life, going out for supper and witnessing some silly water slide shenanigans. It was a great weekend and I'm looking forward to Go All Out's tournament here in June.

Unconsciously incompetent

Currently I am reading Kathy Keats "Success from the Inside", it is a great book that talks about the psychological side of becoming successful in any given sport (or any goal for that matter).  In the book Kathy lists the four phases you pass through while learning a new skill. The very first step describes me to a tee in herding:

"First you are unconsciously incompetent.  You aren't very skilled and you don't even know it.  You have no idea what you are doing right or wrong".  That line pretty much sums up my herding lessons.  I am trying to get my dog to circle the sheep, change sides, move them at a slow pace, lie down on balance points, etc.  Half the time I have no idea why something went right or wrong. My instructor is busy telling me "yes stop there" or "move to your right" or "back up" and I am happily trying to obey but still not sure why I am doing it. I have brief moments of clarity where I think I have it figured out, and then I go and make the same mistake a few minutes later.  As frustrating as it can be sometimes, I am not discouraged at all.   I am really enjoying the challenge of learning a new dog sport and I am always eager for my next lesson.  I understand that the setbacks and frustrations are all part of learning a new skill and one day we will be at the fourth phase "unconsciously competent when you don't have to think about the skills." That day is a long way in the future, but for now I will celebrate every small success as it happens.

I think one of the biggest draws for sheep herding is watching my dog do something that is instinctive. I don't have to teach, bribe, coax or manipulate my dog to do anything. She wants to herd. Spryte gets into the pen and instantly goes to work. She is focused and confident, and an intense calm comes over her that I never see anywhere else.  Spryte knows what she needs to do to move the stock, all I have to do is channel it.

Each week I'm excited by our progress. Sometimes it's as little as stopping her at the top of the sheep and starting her again, other weeks I am able to send her around the sheep and when I back up she calmly brings them to me in a relatively straight line. This is a skill we both still struggle with, but each week it gets a little bit better.   I am doing my part by watching videos and reading what I can about herding. Spryte is doing her part by patiently putting up with my mistakes and never giving up. We are both learning what our jobs are and sheep herding is starting to happen.

One day soon I will have to get pictures of Spryte herding, or maybe another video. For now the pics on here are from our walk yesterday around the acreage.

Kathy Keats agility seminar

Spryte and I attended the Kathy Keats seminar last Friday.  I realised this is the 5th year in a row I have been at her workshops.  Kathy always sets up international courses with many challenges we wouldn't normally see in Canadian competition.  The first few times I went to one of her workshops I felt completely lost.  Strider always tried his best, but I just wasn't used to handling those type of challenges. Each time we attended a workshop we learnt more and were better able to handle the difficult elements on course. The last few years it has "clicked" for Strider and I, and we would often do very well.  We became a team and it was a great feeling. 

Well this year it was time to bring Spryte out.  She is young and still learning about self control and agility in general.  I was very pleased with her accuracy on many of the challenges like backsides of jumps and pull throughs.  When we broke exercises down into smaller pieces of 6 or so obstacles, Spryte could perform them perfectly.  However as soon as we did a full course her excitement level rose drastically and the errors began to occur.  What we mostly struggled with was holding our contacts and hitting weavepole entries with speed.  She just gets so excited that she doesn't want to slow down and stop on contacts or collect for those difficult weave poles. For her it is much more fun to blast past them and continue on.  These are the mistakes typical of a green dog and once she learns to control her excitement she will be a phenomenal agility dog.  But for now we will continue to work on the basics.

Kathy had many tips for us and offered lots of positive encouragement.  The biggest piece of advice she gave me was to stop all motion when Spryte makes a mistake.  Up until this point when practising if she misses her contacts or misses her weave poles I just turn her around and we do it again.  The problem with this is Spryte doesn't necessarily know that a mistake was made, it just becomes one continuous loop of agility.  She gets more and more excited by all the motion and then accuracy goes out the window.  So I need to consciously stop myself from continuing on.  It has become such a habit that I find myself forgetting to stop and instead winding her up even more.

When Kathy pointed this mistake out to me, it became so obvious, and now that I am aware of it, I can make the necessary changes.  That is the nice thing about having a coach.   They notice things that you can't because you are too busy being "in the game".  It is the reason I attend so many agility seminars.  When you train by yourself you tend to develop bad habits.  Seminars fix my mistakes and set us on the right path again.  So I look forward to our next agility seminar with Terry Simons in May and in the meantime Spryte and I will continue to train and work on improving self control and teamwork.

Beating ring nerves

      I often have students come up to me after class commenting on how they would love to start competing with their dog, but their ring nerves are preventing them from entering a show.  Having ring nerves isn't necessarily a bad thing. It means you take the sport seriously and you really want to do a good job.  A little bit of ring nerves will keep you focused and provide just enough adrenaline to think clearly and react quickly.  However too much of this emotion can bog you down, causing slow reaction times, foggy thinking and poor handling decisions.
   
 I have been competing in a variety of dog sports for 10+ years and I do still on occasion get ring nerves.  Here is how I keep it under control.
   
 The first thing I do is remind myself how much I love my dog and how proud I am of him (or her).  I know it seems a little silly, but it helps keep me grounded.  It helps remind me that I am simply playing a game with my dog and we do this because I love spending time with him, and I love the teamwork that the sport fosters.  It doesn't matter if we win or loose, get that Q or miss it by a point, in the end my dog always tries his hardest.  How can I be upset with him or embarrassed by his performance if I know he did his best? Instead I am proud of his efforts, regardless of the outcome, my dogs never disappoint me.  I am not going to waste my round stressing over what might happen, I am going to enjoy our time together and celebrate at the end of the round like we won the world cup.
  
 One of the biggest keys to beating ring nerves is being prepared.  If you do your homework, practise with your dog regularly, know the rules, and know how the sport is played, then you will know you have done your best when you walk into the ring. You will be confident in yourself and your dogs ability.  If you neglect to practise with your dog, you will walk to the line doubting yourself and your chances at success. As soon as you start to doubt, the ring nerves will begin to take over.  You will start to visualise all the things that can go wrong, and you will loose that confident air that the more experienced competitors have.  Your dog will pick up on your lack of confidence, and likely begin to send a plethora of calming signals your way.  This will only add to your ring stress, because now your normally attentive dog is busy yawning, sniffing the ground, looking away and acting sluggish.  At this point, take a couple of deep breaths, try and picture something positive, tell yourself you will be better prepared next time and begin your run.
    
 Having a warm up routine can really help too.  If you get to the show late, miss your walk through and then run into the ring after the ring steward hollers your name 3 times, you will be stressed.  And if you are stressed you can bet your ring nerves will take over.  So instead plan a warm up routine that begins at your home.  Make sure you pack everything you need, so that you and your dog are comfortable at the show.  Next get to the show grounds early, so you can set up your crates, and walk your dog around to acclimatize him to the new facility.  Then let him rest in his kennel until it is your time in the ring.  How early you get your dog out for his run really depends on your dog.  Some dogs might need 15 minutes or more to relax and be able to focus.  Some dogs do better with very little warm up as they get over stimulated by all the activity.  There is no right or wrong way, you need to try different things and see what works best for your dog.  Develop a routine together and the consistency of the routine will keep you calm and give you confidence.  Your warm up might include focus work, tricks, stretching, games and obedience moves.  Again it really depends on you and  your dog.  Instead of standing around stressing about the course, the judge and disengaging from your dog,  having a consistent routine will keep you and your dog connected, and help you feel like you are actively doing your best to prepare for your round.

       Another great technique for beating ring stress is to visualise success.  If you picture yourself nailing that front cross, getting your footwork perfect during your heeling pattern, running through the course in the correct order, then you are practising being successful.  Most people instead focus on what will go wrong.  They visualise themselves being late with their cross, they picture the dog leaving them to go sniff, they picture themselves getting lost on course.  Your mind cannot tell the difference between visualisation and the real thing, so you are in essence practising being wrong.  You are practising failure.  And because your mind thinks its real, your body will react as if it is real.  Your ring nerves will come on full force along with other negative emotions associated with failure.  You will be anxious, feel disappointed, maybe even a little depressed.  You will walk into the ring feeling as if its too late, the round already lost.  If you practise visualising success, you will enter the ring feeling confident and in control.
  
  You also need to remember that dogs are not robots and they are not going to be perfect every time.  You WILL fail, you WILL loose, so you might as well just accept it and move on.  It is not worth stressing every time you go into the ring, wondering if you will pass this round or will you be "giving another donation to the club".    Everyone at that show has failed before.  They understand what it's like and they will not judge or ridicule you.  In fact many times a friend or friendly stranger will come up and comfort you, offering words of support.  In the end it is just a dog show, it is not world peace, it is not the cure for cancer.  It is just a ribbon, it is just a title. And there will always be another show.  So reflect on what went wrong, what you can practise and improve on to better prepare for next time.  Accept the failure, learn from it and then get over it.

   So the next time you enter a dog show make sure you are prepared, you have a great warm up routine,  you have visualised success and remember to stop for a moment to appreciate your dog and give him a hug. Remember that this is just a game, and not a life altering moment.  And those pesky ring nerves will melt away.

Weaves and Wraps

Last night was lesson 4 of my Weave pole class.  It is the first time I have run this class and I was absolutely amazed at the progress of the dogs.  After only 4 sessions, there is a Duck Toller in class weaving a full set of six weave poles with entries from all sides.  There are also several other dogs in class that have 3 sets of two poles set out, with the gates angled open.  By the end of next class the poles should be almost in line with each other and I have full confidence that they will be weaving a set of six weave poles by the end of the last class.  It's absolutely incredible that a dog can go from knowing nothing about weave poles to weaving a complete set of six poles in a six week class.  I love this method and I will never teach my dogs to weave any other way again.

Spryte and I continue to work on her agility skills.  I try and go back and revisit foundation skills as often as I can.  It's easy to get caught up in working full courses, but then the finer skills tend to fall apart.  Lately I have noticed she cannot turn tight over a jump. Her idea of a wrap around a wing is to fling yourself as far as you can over the jump and then turn back to me.  She turns wider than a Mack truck!

I did a lot of sending her around cones and obstacles as a puppy.  She loved the game and would race around the cones, running as tight to them as she could, and then she would race back to me.  Next we did it around wing jumps and again she had great success.  We added a jump bar, and it was decent, she still jumped a little long, but nothing like what I see out on course.  Yesterday we practised out in the yard and again I had terrible wide turns.  I was really starting to think that I need to fix this. While pondering over her wide turns it hit me, I have only every done wraps from a stationary position.  Every time I did the ground work for this exercise, I was standing still and sending her out ahead of me.  So of course as soon as I added a lot of motion into the picture, she read it as "jump with extension" and would jump way past the jump before turning.  I had added motion into our courses when working on wraps, but I had never done it in the groundwork. 

It seems so obvious to me now, but it was such an easy thing to overlook when training.  That's the thing with dog training, you can't possibly remember to train every skill to perfection every time.  You will miss stuff and then you must go back and retrain that skill. So Spryte and I have started revisiting our wraps.  I use "dig dig dig" to cue the wrap around the jump and I have started adding a lot of my motion into the picture.  And just as expected, the first few times she flew over the jump.  By the end of the session she started to collect her stride and jump close to the wing and wrap around it.  It's no were near trained, and I don't expect it to carry over into the ring yet. But with a little more practise I should start to get the tight turns that I desire.

That is why I love dog training so much.  There is always something that needs work.  The behaviour is never perfect and it will take years of consistent training to get my dogs to the level I want them. In the meantime I get to spend countless hours training my dogs.  This means many hours of bonding with them, playing, learning from each other and growing as a team.  Nothing beats the relationship that forms between a handler and a performance dog.  It truly is priceless.

Here is a video of Spryte and I working on "wrap" when she was a puppy. Notice I always send and don't add motion! Naughty me!  The goal was for her to wrap the cone and always turn towards me, never turn away from me. If she turned the wrong way, we redid it.  I also wanted distance (that's why I am far from the cone)

Today's practise on wraps and motion.  Her first time over Spryte didn't notice the wrap signals and jumped long (and looked very surprised that I had turned), after that she started paying attention and wrapped tightly around the wings.  The jump bar is angled to encourage jumping tight to the the wing.

Princess Spryte

Spryte is a princess.  Well she thinks she is a  princess anyway. And princess' have a lot of demands. They absolutely MUST sleep in a king size bed, with their head on the pillow.  They MUST be with people all the time or yodelling will commence.  They cannot walk on gravel it hurts their delicate paws. And they despise walking in mud puddles, royal paws melt when wet.  Spring is a really difficult time for princesses.

Last weekend at the agility trial a mud puddle formed right in front of the entry door to the arena.  I went out to potty Spryte, not really paying attention to my dog, just assuming she would be right beside me. Next thing I know I hit the end of the leash and stumble forward, I turn around to see Spryte with her heels dug into the mud, absolutely refusing to take one more step. It was like being on the end of a horse lead, with the horse rearing up and backing quickly away. Who knew a 20 pound dog could have so much strength?!.   Absolutely no amount of coaxing or leash pressure could convince Spryte to muddy her precious little paws.  So like a good little servant, I picked up my princess and carried her across the abyss.

Princess Spryte made another appearance today.  I took her out herding, and with the plus 10 heat wave we've been having, the farm was a sloppy mess.  I took her out of her kennel in the car, placed her on the ground and began to walk towards the round pen.  Well just like last weekend, the bucking horse appeared and we're dodging mud puddles left, right and center. With some annoyed "lets go" from me and a bit of dragging, we finally end up at our destination.  At this point I'm just hoping that the lure of the sheep will distract her highness from the displeasure of muddy feet.

Spryte's little face lit up when she saw the sheep.  She went to work right away, moving the ewe's around and bringing my flock to me.  She  still did dodge mud puddles, but at least she kept working.  Then I was instructed to have Spryte lie down at the top of the flock. I'm thinking no problem, my dog has obedience training. But princess Spryte would have none of that nonsense. Princesses absolutely DO NOT lie down in the mud! How disgusting! I'm repeatedly telling her to lie down and she is busy glaring at me like I've lost my mind.  Our little showdown ended with Spryte in a half crouch and me standing over her thinking I should have gotten a boy.  Ahhhh. life with royalty.

great day at the agility show

I had a great time at the CKC agility trial today.  The barn is warm and bright and the people very welcoming. The judge had some great courses too, challenging, but still very fair.

 It's been interesting watching different breeds of dogs compete.  That is one great thing about CKC agility, it tends to bring out breeds you wouldn't normally see.  Some non traditional agility breeds here this weekend have been a Scottie, Black Russian Terriers, Irish Setters, a Norrbottenspets and an Am staff.  Everyone seemed to be having a great time with their dogs and there are lots of impressive teams to watch between runs.

The shelties had a great day today. Spryte Q'de in all 4 runs.  We started with 2 jumpers runs this morning.  This worked out well for Spryte as she could really open up and run and not worry about contacts or tables.  Then on to standard in the afternoon, where she had great 2 on 2 off positions on the dogwalks and her running aframes were very nice too.  The first Aframe she was maybe only 6 inchs into the yellow before leaving, but her second one she strided well into the center.  I was so pleased! We have been working hard on retraining her aframe and it is starting to pay off.

Spryte was fast and responsive in all her runs today.  Once again I had that wonderful rush I get every time I run my little speed demon. She is causing me to become addicted to agility, like a bad drug, I just have to have more!

Strider Q'd 2/4 runs and finished up his Excellent standard title. He was sucked into the tunnel vortex during a few runs causing some off courses (shelties are very susceptible to this black hole type phenomenon), but after that he started to pay attention to the human half of the team and ran wonderfully for the rest of the day.  I still love running my old guy.  He can be so naughty, but he does it with a smile on his face the whole time.  You just have to shake your head and laugh.  I love that little dog!

Well off to bed, we need our rest for another great day of agility tomorrow.