# First "real" class. THIS is what I was looking for!



## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

Last week was the end of my first 8 week Beginner II class. At the end of the class, my instructor pulled me aside and told me that she was advancing me to the "real" Beginner II class held on a different day. Yeah- I know that's pretty weird, but I've kinda stopped caring about the name of the class. Every class has had us doing more and more advanced stuff than the last class, so I guess I have no complaints.

Anyhow- so today was my first class in the real Beginner II, and let me just say: *THIS is what agility should be like!* I was the only person to advance, so I don't feel arrogant saying that we were the best in the previous class. Now, we are _most certainly_ the worst in class! HAHA! I am the newbie and all the other people are repeaters. They are all so much better than me, and so - very - fast!

It was so awesome to be challenged. We did a 16 sequence jumpers course with my first serpentine. Man was that hard. The start jump actually faced _away_ from the second jump- so that was very difficult. Just an overall tough course! But we made it through quite sloppily, just happy to make it.

We then moved to the standard course at 19 obstacles. Lots of tricky stuff here- man... way to much to really describe. Just an overall difficult course. But all my classmates got through it pretty well, and we were able to just make it. I still have a ton of work to do on weaves (we're only to 4 poles, with an offset on each) and the course had a full 12 pole set. We also need to start getting real about contacts. 

Even so- all my classmates said they were impressed and felt we would fit well in the class. So encouraging!

Oh yeah- lastly- there's a couple Border Collies in the class. It's sick. So very sick.  I watched them run, looked down at Pimg (who almost as if she had the same thought- looked up at me) and I told her: "Wow- you're slow." :crazy: haha!

Here's our courses for today. Obviously not to scale, but I am confident I got the angles all correct and distances relative.

Standard:









Jumpers:


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## Whiteshepherds (Aug 21, 2010)

wildo said:


> Oh yeah- lastly- there's a couple Border Collies in the class. It's sick. So very sick.  I watched them run, looked down at Pimg (who almost as if she had the same thought- looked up at me) and I told her: "Wow- you're slow." :crazy: haha!


LOL, poor Pimg.  
Sounds like you had a great time!


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## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

Oh yeah- it was a very fun class. I kept thinking to myself- "Wow, this is NOT easy. And I love it!" There's so much to learn. Tonight I realized that agility practitioners are masters at quickly processing stimuli. I told me instructor tonight that I think my mind goes totally blank while I am sprinting to keep up with my dog. I think I will front cross here, rear cross there, and in the end I kinda just stumble on through... LOL!


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## MaggieRoseLee (Aug 17, 2001)

WOW, those courses look really hard to me..... glad you got thru them.

The BIG problem I ran into when I started agility (and all my classmates) is that we started to focus way more on 'doing a course right' and getting the dog thru successfully.

No longer WATCHING THE DOGS AND THEIR SPEED/ATTITUDE! Because when a course gets harder and 'twisty' it seems we start yelling more, getting more confused, calling our dogs OFF and away from what they were headed for, being way more aware of where WE have to go (and not where the dog is).

Frankly, when we start doing the above, it starts slowing our confused dogs down (why is Mom always YELLING at me now???) which makes is SEEM like we are now doing WAY better! Look, now we are clean, now my dog is with me, now we get thru all the obstacles. At the same time our dogs suddenly are thinking everything they are running to is wrong wrong wrong (bad dog bad dog bad dog!)

But what I was also doing was UNmotivating my dog and sucking all the fun out of agility. What she used to love to tear thru cause we were having so much fun, became something she'd rather trot thru cause that assured success, mom wasn't constantly in the way, and no more yelling! So THIS is what agility must be for all time in the future!

So I know NOW that it's all about breaking MY skills down to control my dogs at speed. And if I have to break down a course of 18 obstacles to mini-type courses in my mind so it FORCES me to stop and REWARD REWARD REWARD REWARD and keeps my dog at speed.

Funny cause I actually prefer class now when it's made up of short sequences that make me learn the handler stuff and look forward to those. But that's me! 

Good luck and keep having fun!


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## JakodaCD OA (May 14, 2000)

I guess all places have different ideas on what to 'call' their classes..Those courses look more intermediate/advanced to me vs calling it Beg 2

I agree with MRL, I like to do more sequencing vs running full courses in the beginning, time to work on contacts, crosses, not only the dogs skills but MY skills. 

If you can get a hold of any Greg Derrett DVD's, they are a great learning tool as well. I like his approach to things..

Glad you are liking your new class tho! Have fun (and heck those borders look fast and are fast, but they can demolish a course just as a fast


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## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

Wow- that's not really the responses I thought this thread would elicit. I'm not sure it's fair to judge the class based on the class name. Yeah- the courses were REALLY hard, but only one person in the eight person class (ME!) struggled to get through it, and I'm the new guy. So that alone should be enough to gauge the level of the class, regardless of the name of the class.

MRL- I am confused by your post. You said:


MaggieRoseLee said:


> Because when a course gets harder and 'twisty' it seems we start yelling more, ... *being way more aware of where WE have to go *(and not where the dog is).
> 
> Frankly, when we start doing the above, it starts slowing our confused dogs down
> 
> *So I know NOW that it's all about breaking MY skills down to control my dogs at speed.*


Did you not just contradict yourself? What I liked about the longer course is that we got to walk it, think for ourselves, try it out how we thought, and then learn about how to do it better. Of course the instructor didn't just tell us to go do the course and then class was over... Of course we broke down each step, learned new methods, and tried it over and over.

For me, it's nice to have things broken down- but when they are broken down to the point where they lose scope with the big picture, then they are no longer helpful. I very much enjoyed the opportunity to think for myself, inevitably fail from lack of experience, and then learn the new/better ways to handle the course. For me, this was the optimal way to learn.


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## JakodaCD OA (May 14, 2000)

Willy I wasn't putting down what they called the class, not my intention at all. Those are the types of course I would "like" in a class, challenging and make you think.


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## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

No worries Diane. It can be really tough to decipher tone via written communication. I was just surprised a bit by the responses- mostly by MRL's. I respect her opinion, but am confused by her response. I'm sure she wasn't intending to contradict herself, and I am hoping she can provide some clarity. 

In rereading her response, I still think there is a contradiction there- but I also see that I misread it. I think she was saying that she breaks the course down _in her head_ so that she can focus on sections. I took this to mean that she disliked working long sequences in class and that doing so was a bad way to learn. I think I just mistook her.

I think you've recommended the Greg Derrett DVDs to me in the past. I've checked out one "foundations of agility" (a Moe Strenfel one- this one). It was helpful, but I haven't yet implemented everything in there. There's so much to work on initially, it's hard to focus on one thing. I probably should consider doing more _foundation_ work though!

One thing my instructor told me on our first run (the Jumpers course) is that Pimg looked great, but *I* made a ton of mistakes. For this reason, I was also considering getting a handler skills DVD like this. But still- maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. Maybe I should just bite the bullet and get the Greg Derrett foundations video.

[EDIT]- Opps, I guess that Linda Mecklenburg one is a book. But Greg Derrett does have a handler oriented DVD.


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## JakodaCD OA (May 14, 2000)

willy it is always US the handlers that mess up the dogs, usually the dogs know exactly what to do, but until we get "our" act together, we definately can confuse our dogs) 

Foundations is a good place to start as well.

I tend to break down courses in my head as well (when walking one)..I always found it easier in the end, to remember the WHOLE course if I broke it down into sections.

I always liked to run a course as straighforward as possible. When I started agility , many moons ago, it was in it's infancy, the courses were pretty straightforward as well, you'd see alot of say novice courses, that were set up so that the handler NEVER did back crosses, Reverse flow pivots, front crosses, blind crosses ) 

As agility progressed, the courses became more difficult/challenging, and we would 'have' to adapt to all those "moves" they've thrown in. Sometimes people forget those "moves" can help you or kill you

Tho I rarely compete anymore, I still try to break down my full courses, walk them the way I "think" will make that course easiest for my dog vs myself. I think alot of competitors over analyze their courses, but that's just me. 

The reason why I like Greg Derrett's stuff is he tries to show how "easy" it can really be for both dog and handler. I LOVE his "box" stuff..I took a seminar on it once and it was great...he basically sets up 4 jumps in a 'box' shape,,there are sooo many different things/moves you can do with just those 4 jumps..

alright I'm done rambling)


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## MaggieRoseLee (Aug 17, 2001)

wildo said:


> MRL- I am confused by your post. You said:


Sorry if I confused you... it's hard to write what I'm thinking sometimes. And it's just my experience from my classes and my dogs.... (and my classmates). 

When we do shorter sequences it much easier to reward the dog, praise the dog, make the dog know things are going well, and fit the handling in without affecting the dog. And they learn all the foundation skills (and I learn them ) at speed with the JOY of agility included.

*When I get into more confusing courses (for me) I STOP being quite as aware of my dog cause I'm all involved with being late/early/wrong place... watching my dog tear over to the wrong thing (usually with me screaming her name). When I'm late with commands my dog jars into her turns. When I'm in her way, she's having to avoid crashing into me. *

All of those issues in the 'bold' are things I have to avoid with my greener dogs for the first few years. And ALL of that is what comes up when we start more complex courses. Doing that stuff will end up with an EXTREMELY accurate dog that I'll always run a clean course with. When I started with my first dog, this is what I got, I thought my dog was brilliant and we initially did VERY well in both classes and trials.

But

But

What it turned out I accidentally was teaching my dog is that agility really isn't so fun anymore and they better slow down. Because 'suddenly' there are course changes. 'suddenly' mom is in the way. 'suddenly' she is screaming at me. 

But when my dog ran slow............there was no yelling no abrupt sudden changes no problems at all! Nice flowing SLOW courses that were absolutely perfect. Well, almost perfect. Cause we didn't make time anymore.

So it's just something to be aware of that happens to many of us when we start up with our first dogs. Not all of us. But if you are aware of it, then you can make sure to remember that the MOST important thing is your dogs attitude, joy and willingness to 'whats next whats next whats next' when you are out there. Your goal should NOT be primarily to do an entire course clean. 

And if you DO have that attitude with your dog, then it doesn't matter how tight/twisty/confusing the course is...........you'll both do fine.


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## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

Thanks for the clarification- that definitely makes sense. It does raise a question for me (and to be clear- I'm not intending to be argumentative- it's an honest question). I know that Mals, specifically, are pretty sensitive to verbal corrections. I could definitely see yelling/screaming being counterproductive for them on an agility course. But I didn't think that GSDs typically were so affected by verbals. It made me curious if your first dog was pretty sensitive in this area?

I'm not discounting what you are saying, I know both you and Jakoda have WAY more experience than me! I'll have to do an experiment with this running the course silent, and running the course screaming my head off. haha!


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## MaggieRoseLee (Aug 17, 2001)

> But I didn't think that GSDs typically were so affected by verbals. It made me curious if your first dog was pretty sensitive in this area?


I've found my dogs want to do it 'right'. They also love me and want to keep me happy. So while they don't necessarily shut down and leave the room when they think they are 'wrong' .... They are also not having so much fun. And when I slowly start sucking out the fun, I'm also slowly losing the speed.

Now, 7 years into this with Bretta, cause she's SO got the fundamentals down and SO realizes I'm the problem (  ) I can scream like a banshee as I watch her rear disappear into an off course tunnel and she'll fly out as fast as ever.... Cause she ALSO knows that when she pops out of that tunnel I'm NOT mad, ever ever ever. 

And when we STARTED with the training for the first few years she didn't KNOW there wasn't any 'mad' or 'bad dog' or negatives. She knew what it sounded like. And she knew there was a problem and would naturally figure it was HER! 

The longer I'm able to train my dogs. The more I know it's about my handling so they do the obstacles right and get tons of rewards. If there's a mistake, it wasn't my dog. And I am getting better and better at making sure I focus on them to assure them that it may have just been a bit crazy, and mommy did almost crash to the ground cause she was in the way, but YOU were a good dog treat treat tug tug treat treat while I figure out how to fix the problem either myself or with the instructor talking to me. 

I have found my GSD's to be very sensative and responsive to my moods and very willing to please. So even though I'm furious at myself for doing something wrong AGAIN......... I can't let my dogs see the anger/frustration cause they have no idea it's about me and they will think it's about them. So keeping the courses manageable for ME and my level and still have the ability to praise reward stay upbeat while progressing.

You and your dog are both doing so well that it's just something that, if you are absolutely aware that speed and attitude FROM THE DOG is just (more?) important than doing a course right for the first few years (not kidding, years). Then your dog will have also learned, really learned, that agility is fun, agility is fast and not have the TIME issues rear it's ugly head. Rarely if ever can you get the speed back after a few years. But you can ALWAYS continue to learn and improve handling skills to get a clean and accurate run.


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## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

Gotchya! You're last paragraph helped it sync in for me. Thanks!


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## AgileGSD (Jan 17, 2006)

Glad to hear you are in a class you're happy with!



wildo said:


> Thanks for the clarification- that definitely makes sense. It does raise a question for me (and to be clear- I'm not intending to be argumentative- it's an honest question). I know that Mals, specifically, are pretty sensitive to verbal corrections. I could definitely see yelling/screaming being counterproductive for them on an agility course. But I didn't think that GSDs typically were so affected by verbals. It made me curious if your first dog was pretty sensitive in this area?


 IMO it is more about motivation then it is about dogs being sensitive or not. Practicing full, tricky courses where you are concentrating most on getting everything just right can be very demotivating to your dog because you often have to stop, go back and fix something. The dog then begins to feel like you are unpredictable in where you will be directing them and that sometimes, you seem upset when they make a choice they think is right. And often, handlers forget to reward the good parts because they are so focused on the tricky stuff. Then they reward the dog when, after 3 tries and increasingly slow performances they finally "get" something (usually the handler and not the dog!). Over time, the dog becomes trained to run slower and more carefully because that is what is being rewarded. 

With my young dogs, I usually go with the flow in training. If they take a wrong obstacle or miss something but are running and focused, I don't stop them to fix it. I go on, reward them and then if I need to work on the problem area, I'll take them back and try the sequence again. Too often, people get so stuck on wanting to make the "Oops" right that they repeatedly stop mid-course to try again. That can be extremely demotivating to a dog who really thinks they are doing what you want and is something to keep in mind.


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## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

AgileGSD said:


> With my young dogs, I usually go with the flow in training. If they take a wrong obstacle or miss something but are running and focused, I don't stop them to fix it. I go on, reward them and then if I need to work on the problem area, I'll take them back and try the sequence again.


This is exactly the way I train. I figure Pimg (and I!) are still to green to expect perfection. So when we make a mistake, oh well!


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## lylol (Feb 18, 2009)

Willy... sounds like you found the challenge that was lacking for you!! yeah. I read that you started with some Moe Strenfel foundation video... she comes and teaches at my instructors place twice a year... and I learn so much from her. She (and Derrett and Susan Garrett... all great videos) practices positional cues... which means when the dog sees you in x position in relationship to an obstacle/jump, it means the dog should do x everytime. From reading your posts I think you might enjoy studying this kind of handling system... its premise is that providing consistent cues everytime makes it clear for the dog to know what we expect... and clarity brings confidence and builds drive. I like the "learning" side of agility. 

My instructor made us all do the last six week session going back to basics about rewarding (food, toys, verbal) as we run... and included the "dont always stop when the dog messes up" discussion ... it was VERY hard for me to change old habits but very rewarding to see the difference it made in the dogs... she also gave us handlers positive rewards when we succeeded.. like a dog toy and points towards $ off next class. So I am enjoying the discussion on this thread!


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