Monday, December 07, 2015

Baby Dog Consistency in Baby Steps

Kili and I attended a trial one day this past weekend. We had a fabulous day. She got her first Advanced Standard Q, and although it was her only Q of the day, she ran really fabulously, losing the runs on a couple of simple things. She blew a dogwalk contact in her second Standard run - she saw the tunnel in front of her and just couldn't help herself... but in a moment that showed she's really starting to listen to me, she did call off the tunnel and redirect to the correct obstacle (in this case it was actually the other side of the same tunnel) and continued the rest of the run pretty flawlessly. Her Jumpers run was actually AMAZING (see the video below) so it's really unfortunate that she decided to stand up and shake after I left her at the start line, because it ruined her focus and caused her to step past the chute (the first obstacle) earning her a refusal. The actual run was absolutely flawless though!

All in all, even though our Q rate continues to be fairly consistently 1 run per day, her general performance has really become a lot more consistent. I worry about mistakes that will cost us Q's instead of stressing about whether my dog is going to play with me. I have a lot more fun now knowing my dog is going to listen to me... well mostly, because impulse control and taking the wrong obstacles is still something we're working on but at least it doesn't involve running the entire ring without me!


2 comments:

Never Say Never Greyhounds said...

You guys are looking so good! Wish we could meet at a trial one day, but I guess we don't even compete in the same organization. She has really turned out beautiful!

Apex Agility Greyhounds said...

I know! How fun would that be? Might be interesting to not be the only greyhound at a trial! Though, I guess you do periodically get to see some other hounds running at the Invitational and such. I, however, do not as we are the only greyhound running in CKC, and while I don't think we're the only one running in AAC, no one else is near me. I sort of toyed with the idea of going down to Montana to run some AKC (my trainer goes down there a lot with her labs) so I could go to the Invitational, but it would be hard because I'd really only be able to do a few trials a year, and the rest of you guys run all year, so I probably wouldn't be able to make it to the invitational.