Warming up

I thought I would go through some things I learned at the DGS seminar on warming up your dog. First of all warming up your dog actually increases their performance. If you can mimic some of the activity you will be doing on course, this will help their brain too. Its gets their brain thinking and remembering. The first part of the warm up is the elimination phase. A 5-10 minute walk which also allows them to use the bathroom. After that , the next 5-15 min move to a slight jog so your dog is trotting or to a slight gallop. By this time your dogs heart rate should have increase and there is good blood flow to the muscles. Now its time to stretch your dog. You want at the very least to stretch the major muscle groups and the toes. When you are done with this ,start mimicking the activity your dog will be doing. If you are running an agility course, your dog will be doing tight turns, then practice figure eights through your legs or over the practice jump. Remember its not just for their muscles, its for their brain too. If its not your turn to run after you have finished all this, keep your dog moving.

Im home

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What a long day and Im so glad to be home. Im sure Miley is glad to be home too. The guy sitting next to me yesterday said, "Your dog's bored isn't she?" Yep! It was pouring down rain yesterday morning, so no trips to the park. It did stop raining at lunch time so I took her out and threw the ball for a while but it wasn't enough.

I love her ears in this picture. I was trying to get the contrast between the two grasses and the sky was really dark. The sky part didn't show up that great.
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Ok, I know , enough dog pictures. Now to the seminar. It was a great learning experience. (Miley was bored.) So to start. She was first a human physical therapist. She had a dog going thur college and went to an instructor and said, "What about doing this for animals?". Her instructor told her no one was going to pay money to have their dog worked on. LoL, boy was she wrong. Debbie first job was with the NYC ballet and then she worked for a football team, I think the Chargers. I could be wrong about the name, I kinda get brain fog when people talk about football. Her interest lies in movement.
Structure is very important. We went over structure alot. Through out the two days she would bring different dogs up and we would go over their structure. No dog is perfect. Its important that you know your dogs weakness so that you can strenghten them. Be aware that they could be prone to injury because of that weakness. Catching the injury as early as possible can save you a long recovery and lots of money. If your dog is being injured more than once( I thought she said twice but my notes say once) a year, review their structure and what you are doing with them. If your dog is injured and you are seeing a Chiro, accuputureist(SP?) or rehab vet, and after 3 visits you are really not seeing improvement you need to reevaluate the treatment.
Every month you should completely go over your dog. We all did this with our dogs. She went through all the things we should be checking. It lets you know what is normal and you may find the start of an injury. Every 6 months you should take pictures of your dog. Front, back, one of each side. Then document what the dog is eating, personality and what activities they are doing. Then you can review the pictures is see if there are any changes.
Injuries. If your dog is getting injured or not getting better. What are they doing? It may not be your sport. It maybe what other activities your dog is doing. Like crazy playing in the house with other dogs, ricocheting off furniture (Miley). It could be when your dog is ball playing, they are crazy. Rolling head over heals to get the ball. Swinging from vines by their teeth, twisting all around. Dogs do crazy things. So what is your dog doing. She has a dog that cant seem to learn he cant chase the barn cat through the barn door. The cat runs under the door and bam the dog hit the barn door with his head. Then its back hurts. Just a side note: Dock diving causes hyper extension of the tail. Which could cause back problems. She is not saying its bad. Just be aware so you can find injuries early. Water dogs were having back problems and they figured out it was the flotation devise they were required to wear. So they have redone the flotation devices the dogs have to wear that dont put so much pressure pushing the shoulders up and got rid of the back pain. I just thought these things were interesting.
We did ball work both days. Yes that big wolfhound got on the ball. It took four people but he was on. Your dog needs to be standing comfortably on the ball. If they are squashed, then they aren't working there muscle correctly. You should do the ball daily for 10-14 days, and then go to three days a week. You start for 5-10 minutes and then depending on the dog, you can work up to 25 minutes.
The worse time for injuries is going from cold, to warm to cold. So say a trial starts and its 25 degrees, the it warms up to 68 degrees then it cools down to 30 that evening. More injuries will occur. Going from a warm building, then outside to warm up your dog in the cold and then back in to the warm building can set your dog up for injury.Try to do as much warm up in the warm building as you can. She really like the Back on Track coats. She would use the coat to go from warm to cold. Lots if injuries are seen when dogs are kept out in their cars in cold weather and then brought into the building to run.
She really believes in warming you dog up. And she took us and our dogs through the type of warm up routine we should do. I felt good that I was already doing that except for the stretching part. So Ill have to add that in esp. the toes. I never thought about the toes. Then its really important to cool your dog down. Your dog can die from shock if you run them and their body temperature is high and just put them back in their crate. Also you should stretch them at the end of the cool down too.
Odds and ends. She thinks our a-frames are too soft in the USA. When she did that recent article for Clean Run on the rear end of the dog and the effects with the a-frame. She noticed how hard the dogs were hitting the a-frame going up. And how the equipment flexed. I think she said she was doing an article on this. Buying a puppy. Just because the mother is a great agility dog and the father is a great herding dog, doenst mean all the puppies will have great structure and should go to performance homes. Check their structure. Puppies should be puppies and not jumping and doing equipment until through puppy hood. To many dogs are started early and then when they are 3years old are breaking down. She doesn't like crate rest. We would never tell a person to sit on the couch and rest for weeks after an injury. The dog shouldn't be allowed to be crazy but crate resting constricts the muscles, which you are trying to avoid. Also if you cant figure out which leg is lame. Paint the top of the dogs toe nails with one color and the bottom of the nails with another color. Check the nails in 48 hours to see what is going on.
There was so much information given in this seminar. Conditioning, endurance training, injury recognition ect..It was great. I wouldn't recommend bring a active dog because there is to much down time. I learned so much about structure and it now makes sense to me. We worked on correct stretching, which I needed to learn. Remember this is what I thought I heard and sometimes people dont hear things correctly. So I may have gotten things wrong.

To Tired

Miley is an early bird. She was up and ready to go starting at 5am. Ugh! By 6:45am I couldn't take it anymore. How was she going to make it through the seminar which I figured would be a lot of crate time. So what did I do, I took her to a park. It was early so that first picture is what the sky looked like when we got there. I'm glad no one came in and killed me, you know a wacko. It was freezing, but I threw the ball for 30 min. She must have had a lot of energy to go that long without stopping. Up and down this football field. Doesn't she look like I photo shopped her into the picture. It looks weird. But she was much calmer after that. The seminar was interesting. Im learning alot about structure. I'm understanding it much better this time then the time with Chirs Zink. I'm not sure why. There is a huge and I mean huge Irish Wolfhound in the seminar. He weighs 164lbs and 34 inches at the shoulders( he looks bigger). I cant help it, I just keep staring at him. The owner probably thinks I'm a weirdo. Ive never seen a dog this big before. Debbie Gross Sanders even took a picture of him on the ball. She didn't take any pictures of any other dogs. So that says something. I'm exhausted tonight. I hope I do better tomorrow since I have to drive 4 hours home after the seminar. Ill write more later.

Made it

No sleeping in for me today. Since I was coming to North Carolina and Sheltie Rescue needed to transport a dog, I decided to help out. I needed to pick the dog up by 7:30 this morning. After I picked the dog up, I went back home and loaded the car. I put the rescue sheltie in the bigger crate and Miley in the smaller one. I thought she might be put out that another dog was in her crate but she didn't seem to care. I got the dog transferred and continued on my trip. We got to Durham about an hour before our appointment. So we walked the fields around the club that is hosting the seminar. I decided to try and get some pictures. During one of them , my foot got caught and I fell hard to the ground. Like the true photographer I am ( just kidding), my only thought was for Miley not to move from her spot so I could still get the shot. LoL She didnt move, but I didnt like the picture after I saw it on the computer. Needless to say tonight my whole body hurts. Im to old to fall to the ground.
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This second picture is the one I fell down on.
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We saw Debbie Gross Sanders for our appointment. I told her I didnt think miley was hurt but told about the change in her a-frame performance. She asked me lots of questions about what I feed her, how much and what type of exercise I do. How much agility practice we do a week. She asked about the other dogs in the house and how Miley interacts with them. Then she had me gait Miley. First walking , then running. Then she had Miley play with a toy, fetch and retrieve it. Miley's funny. She would go get the toy and the go really wide so not to get near Debbie at all to bring me the toy. LoL Then she felt Miley's structure. She said Miley had a very nice front. She said lots of shelties have terrible front but Miley's is very nice. Everything felt good. She didnt think Miley was injured. But she did feel Miley is tight in her lower back. She gave me exercises to do with her to stretch her out. She wants me to teach Miley to weave around my legs and add that to our warm up before running agility. She wants me to do very slow hill walking to help her back and thighs. She doesn't like a 2o/2o for Miley which could be making her back tight. I told her I had tried running contact but Miley jumped off from really high. She thinks I should do 4 on the floor. Im not sure what I think about this.
After the appointment I took Miley to a park. I figured a long walk would help her settle when we get back to the hotel. NOT!

Here are some of the pictures.

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