Wrinkles at the field
Hi. Well, I was suppose to trial this weekend, but unfortunately my parents couldn't take me, something came up :( Luckily, my friend's dad was able to take me and her to a field and we were able to do some agility on "real" equipment ;) His dogwalk improved amazingly...it use to be a trot across and down, but now he's actually going faster. I can feel his confidence building, yay! =) Well, overall we had a great time and he ran really well, jumped 20, 22 and 26, didn't knock a bar, great dog I have ;) He also never missed a contact although he couldn't hold much of a 2o2o on the 6'3" aframe since we never get to practice it. His tunnels still aren't too speedy, but I think that's cuz at home he can ram through it and it moves w.out the bags, but at the field it had tons of tunnel bags around it and he's not the kind of dog that enjoys killing them. The only issue that really came up was his weaves...it's so sad, he runs the entire course and then slows down and I guess doesn't really know how to go through them fast. It's not like he doesn't like them, he just doesn't see a point in going fast, he just knows how to weave and does them clean. I made a video but it's pretty long so I didn't want to upload it on here...so here's the link.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXl3_PtnqOc
If anyone has any suggestions on weaves or anything else like handling, I'd love to hear it! Thanks!
Helen and Wrinkles
Re: Wrinkles at the field
Hi Helen!   It looks to me like Wrinkles is very careful with his feet. He is looking down and taking small steps through the weave poles. Weave -o - matic style weave poles are really good at helping dogs with footwork. You can use stick in the ground poles if you don't have access to a weave o matic. Just place the poles at the same distance apart as your weaves (ie 21" on center) but have pole 1 making a 45 degree angle with the ground leaning to the left and pole 2 making a 45 degree angle to the right. you should end up with a line of poles making a   V    looking head on. I rev up my dog at one end, throw a toy down the line and race the dogs to the toy. This helps the dog with footwork and if you reward speed your dog will get faster and faster. Once they start to speed up I gradually tighten the V shape until the poles are upright again. I am sure there are lots of other good ideas out there which will help Wrinkles become a MAW........ (Master - at - Weaving)  ;).....elizabeth