Full Run Success!

Rave has recently put on her big girl pants and successfully run a full flyball course! Now that we have some speed its time to really tweek her box into something brilliant! She gave me new information about exactly what she need from to to continue to have further success! Its very fun to watch her progress because you can see her thinking and putting it all together! Go Rave!

Now her box isn't close to perfect but its getting there! Step by Step! Both of my dogs have had no problems driving to the box to get the ball, its always the drive back that we need the work on. It's very funny, with Rave its the complete opposite! Go figure! She wasn't sure it was a good idea to work away from me... double steping jumps and thinking about turning around... What a difference 2 weeks makes! She single stepped every jump and successfully brought her ball back.... AND!.... dropped the ball for the tug! Go Rave!

Now that she can handle running by herself time to add a dog in the other lane! Cross your 9fingers things continue to go as smoothly as they have this far!

Happy Training!

Lyndsy and Rave

HUGE SUCCESS!!!!!!!

This will be short and sweet!!!! Rave has HUGE success today! We did one jump to the box and back over all four jumps with mildly good drive, but better yet, with her ball, and even more fun, she drove to the tug!!!!!!!!!!!! Here is her video!!! i'm very proud of the little nugget!

Happy Training!

Lyndsy and Rave

It's the distance that will kill you!

Chalk one up in the win column for Rave!! Everytime we work I micromanage and seem to find something else that needs work. This time I give Rave total credit!

After the last blog we've been working really hard on getting the ball off the box. Once you do so many hit-its its hard to start to add the ball, when they learn muscle memory on the box they get into a groove and its hard to tweak that groove. We've lately had HUGE success with adding the ball and bringing it back to me, and dropping it for the tug!!!! Thank god she loves the ball!!!! Because she didn't love the tug, i've never taken that out of the picture. She loves the ball so much that a tug with balls on it is golden!

Now that I am holding the golden tug in one hand and there is a stationary ball in the box, its hard for me to get her to leave me to go to the box. If I have someone call her on the box, she would way rather visit them than do her job! Tough place we are in. BUT! Today, success! Someone called her to the box, she did a turn, got the ball and came back to the tug over a jump. Total success! Now the "easy" part back chaining jumps. I will try to take a lot of video at practice on Sunday so i can post her many successes!

Every practice we have I try to push her more and more. At the last practice we worked on her driving on the flat. We also call this puppy drag racing. She made really really good choices when it was her turn. For some reason she did much better in the left lane, so in the future we will work 3/4 the time in the right lane. She would drive like hell to me 90% of the time, and the other 10% of the time she would go into the other lane and give that dog hell and out running them. But we will work through that, day by day!

Stay tuned for up coming video!
Happy Training!

Lyndsy and Rave

If at first you don't succeed try, try again!

First I need to start by saying, I need to blog more! I do understand that! There is just not enough hours in the day!! Anyway..... I will try to blog more in the future!

The past few sessions Rave and I haven't been seeing eye to eye on our training. The hardest part about training is breaking down the language barrier. After doing this you should have no problem having all kinds of success, but getting past that could take a while. Some dogs you can figure out quicker than others.... Some not so much. After exhausting my tool box full of training tools I was not only tired but VERY discouraged! Going into a training session discouraged is no way to start training. But with all the work we were putting in there just wasn't enough progress in my mind. But finally today! progression!!!!!

In the past Rave would do 2 really good hit its on the box and then we would change her picture by moving jump boards or adding the ball and she would totally shut down. It just blew her mind every time. I couldn't understand why, but once she would fail she would run into her crate and just look at me. I couldn't even pry her out. Talk about discouraging. Not only did I have a dog that didn't want to work with me, but a dog that had lost all trust in me. So to build confidence and trust in me we worked on some tricks. I also listened to the brilliant words of my full of wisdom mother, she said, I think you just need to sit down and have a talk with her, one on one. Hmmmmm she is a dog you know?! Well, okay. Must have worked! Today not only was she totally driving to and from the box, but she failed twice and worked through it both times. The other thing we have run into is the leaving me to go to the box. She also powered through that tonight as well. I could send her from about 10 feet to do hit its off the box. Time to add the ball! I will start by velcroing it so she gets the idea of not only where her mouth needs to be, but where her feet need to be in order to keep her turn snappy and consistent. Good thing she likes a ball! and she drops the ball for the tug! Even better!!!!

Once I have more help I'm going to have someone hold her 15 or so feet from the box and I am going to call her to the box as soon as she lifts off to commit I'm going to yell her name and run away! This should build her confidence going into the box and help her drive to me off the box! The more hit its I do without the ball the harder it will be to add the ball, so I do try to keep these to a minimum and as soon as she is totally comfortable with her picture of the box we start to phase in the ball more and more each session.

The other thing we've been playing with is her speed over jumps. Thank you to my friend Colleen from X flyball for the brilliant ideas to get her driving and powering better over jumps. Who would have thought if you take out the first jump from the box the baby dogs can gather more speed to power over jumps, who would have thought?! DUH?!?!!? By taking out this jump it gives the babies 25 feet instead of 15. By doing this it can take the bunny hopping over jumps and turn it into streamline power jumping. Thanks again Colleen!

I will edit video and post it soon!

Happy Training!
Lyndsy and Rave

We all have our snags....

In training we all go through some rough patches. Our recent rough patch is Rave wants to submissive pee every time we go to work.... So in her most recent videos she is wearing her big girl pants, but she looks awesome!! so i had to share!!!! she loves her denim britches...

Happy training....

Let the wall work begin!

I love wall work! It's probably my favorite part of training. So many things go into doing it "right". There are so many methods out there to follow, or maybe you want to make up your own. In my experience wall work is always a work in progress. I am always learning new things to look for and ways to change props to get exactly what I want. The biggest help in training the wall right is the tool of video.... VIDEO EVERYTHING! Something that you thought looked pretty good, might be a wide turn, or a double hit that you didn't catch with your eye. Key things to look for in my wall work method, head position, make sure your reward is low to keep the dog driving down off the box, make sure the dog isn't launching into the wall from 5 feet, and where they land in the middle of the lane.

To start your wall work I take a 24X24 piece of plywood and cover it in tuff spun matting. Lay it flat on the ground with 2 jump boards in front of it. By this time you have already determined which way your dog will turn. Stand on that side of the board and lure the dog over the jump boards on the target board in the shape of a horse shoe. This is something i will call over and backs. Once your puppy is snappy doing this, start to raise the slant board against the wall. This could be a slow process. Little by little you will notice things you will have to change.

For instance with Rave, I've started to notice instead of her pushing off the wall, she is using the board as a crutch to pivot to push off..... I will go back to a lower board with her for a little bit and not try to rush the process.

By teaching the wall work method I believe it will help your dog transfer the quick on/off method of the wall to the box with very little issue. By making sure there head is in the correct position you will be able to velcro a ball to the wall to simulate the dog getting it off the box. Some dogs get this quicker than others as with anything. Don't rush your dog! Make sure you love exactly what you have before making it harder for your dog.

Make sure your VOLUME is off!!! Otherwise you get to hear my obnoxious training voice :)

Here is a video of Ninja at the end progress, well adding the ball at least....

I'm sure there are things i've forgotten that i will make sure i add the next blog! Stay tuned!! Happy Training!!!

Lynds and Rave

It's about damn time!

I know, I know! It's been a long time since I've blogged about the monsters progress! Well here goes nothing!

Lately we have been working on a new training method for me. We've been learning the touch stick method. Thanks to our friend Colleen from X flyball for help with this new method.

Step one of this method getting the dog to touch the end of the stick with their nose, this can be done by clicking or shaping the puppy. To start, when the puppy goes to touch the bottom of the stick you mark and treat it. Too start you can use food and slowly progress to using the tug as the sole reward. Once they learn to touch the stick, it is the beginning of there fabulous box turn.

Rave's first session of touch stick was funny! It was almost like the stick was alive, anytime she would step foot in the room and i touched the stick she would bark and run away! Silly girl! By the end of the session I was holding the stick and she was driving to it! It's all about baby steps! We will be working slowly on this. No need to rush perfection :) Each time i get out the touch stick I want her to play even more than the last time! So we are doing very short exciting sessions. I am trying to video a good session of this so i can post it. Once i find one that shows each step i will post it!

Happy Training!