Four Paws Class

Ok, I'm sorry I haven't been posting as quickly as we've been doing exciting things, but here I go trying to catch up.

On Tuesday we went back to Four Paws.  The big job of the day was to work on rear crosses.  I was glad we'd been working on them at home, because Jonah had no problem at all in class.  The other two dogs sometimes turned the wrong way, but Jonah was right on the money all but one time when I was a little discombobulated.  We did one sequence of a rear cross to the channel weaves to a turn to the tire:

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So, we'd set the dogs up on our left, rear cross over the jump and do the weaves with the dogs on our right.  Jonah had no trouble with the rear cross or the weaves, but then we were supposed to do a front cross after the weaves before the tire.  Try as I might, I couldn't get past the weaves before he did.  I'm pleased that he's driving through the channel so fast, but it wasn't working for me to get the front cross in.  If the weaves had been straight, I would have been able to get past him, so I guess it's not a real cause for long-term concern.  Anyway, the next time we did a rear cross to the tire as well as to the jump at the beginning, and that worked great! 

We did a bunch of sequences but the one other one that sticks out in my mind is below (impressed with my map?  Just wait for the next post!):

So, the line from 3-4-5-6 was a little tricky.  Our teacher suggested two main ways of doing it.  First, you could send your dog to three while you stayed near two, wait for them to come back to you and get lined up with a fairly straight line through 4-5-6.  Second, you could send your dog to three and be moving between 4 and 5, so when they jump 4 on an angle you're there to catch them and turn them back to 5 and 6.  The first time through we did the second method, where I was more ahead of Jonah, and it seemed pretty natural for us.  Since we're trying to work on having him out in front of me more, I tried the first method the second time.  I think I'm just personally more comfortable when I'm moving, so waiting for him to go jump 3 and come back to me felt awkward, but he got the job done both ways.  It's neat that now we're getting into questions of handling 'style.'  I'm learning that I'm most comfortable in front of Jonah, but it's good practice for us to work the other way, too.  The jury is still out on which style makes Jonah run faster.

After doing a bunch of sequences we spent the last part of the class on the weave poles.  Again, we never got them quite straight but they were only a few inches apart.  I'm excited about this because Jonah is really quick through them and he's doing the one-paw-each-side method.  I'm impatient to get them straight, but since he's still hopping at home and using this different method there, I'm optimistic about what going through the channel method again might do for us.  If it makes him faster, that would be great.  He also never pops out with the channel, even if it's only a few inches apart.

Another main take away point for this class was that I need to be careful about how I get Jonah excited.  I was playing with restraining him, and at first it seemed to be working well, but as the class went on I could tell he was a little bit resentful of me.  After realizing this, I tried getting him excited without being so physical.  I'd just bat around with him, getting him to jump and wag rather than holding him still.  This seemed to work better.

So, overall, this was a great lesson with tough sequences, rear crosses and good weaving progress.  I felt like I didn't give Jonah my best because I was so stressed about getting through the last week of classes, but he was a star nonetheless.