Sunday, February 14, 2010

Today's lesson








I took a lesson with Meagan today. These exercises are from this months Clean Run called "Skill of the Month" by Karen Holik.
I ran the dark circles. It was beautiful. Even Meagan said it was beautiful, except for the fact that I did a serpentine through #3-5 instead of the treadle which is how it was written. LoL Oops. Then I tried it as a treadle. I couldn't do it. So I need to remember to use my outside arm to pull her through and run backwards. It was difficult and I have some practice to do.



This is the same set up just different numbering. I think Meagan made this one out of her head because I couldnt find it. Once again I ran it beautiful except I left out #4 and #5 . Oops again. Once I added all the numbers in I had problems getting Miley's head coming out of the tunnel ( sorry the #5 is suppose to be on the other tunnel entrance). I needed to step back and get her head coming out of the tunnel. We also worked on not setting her up straight in front of the tunnel. Say there was another jump straight pass #2( above course). Setting your dog up this way, you will be able to make it pass #2 faster to cue your dog.



When I first walked this course (below) I was planning on post turning #4-5 and then rear crosses #6, then use an opposite arm cue to bring her in after #8 to get #9. But then I started thinking she might take an off course into the tunnel after #4, so I need a stronger turning cue. So I decided to front cross #4-5 and then, the opposite arm cue for #8 didn't seem right. So I decided to front cross #8-9. When we ran everything worked beautiful. She almost took the off course tunnel after #4, but I called her and she looked and came over jump #5. WhooHoo!!! The rest she ran great. Then Meagan wanted me to run it with rears. So I reared #4-5 and she read it nicely. I rear crossed in front of #6, this pushed her out when coming over #8 to the off course #11. So Meagan said I needed to rear cross after #6 (like below), then push her path a little wide after coming over #7. After that you will pull her in. This wideness will bring her back at a diagonal over #8 and it will be a straight path to #9, and #10. And of course it worked like a charm.




















4 comments:

Kathy Mocharnuk said...

looks like a challenging lesson. Treadles are my one thing I am still getting the timing on, pulling them in just enough and then moving forward, a real timing thing. I had them down really well with Chloe but with the border collies the timing is so different.

Dawn said...

Wow. All this "mat work" has just GOT to make her table better in trials! Glad you got a private lesson, I think Miley's too fast for group lessons and too advanced. She just flies over those jumps, not an ounce of extra energy expended, low and sleek, that's Miley-girl!

Sara said...

What a fun lesson. I hope my teacher sets that sequence up for us.

Sounds like it was a very positive session for you guys.

Chris and Ricky said...

Glad you got to take a lesson yesterday - sounds like it went very well! Those are some very challenging sequences! Much more difficult than the stuff we see in trials, don't you think?