Coaching from Janita and Freya's first clear round in A1

Training with Janita

It has been a long time since we have had a training lesson. It was really nice to get some new ideas and reminding of my old bad habits. At first we did a course from start to finish without caring of mistakes. I did this first with Pixie. First I was able keep calm but yet again Pixie’s forcefulness made my too busy in my mind. We did ok but most of course went in a half chaos. Next was Freya. I thought this course would be way too hard for her. She did really well although we had our braking points in whisky turn and some points where she needed read the course in long line. In the end I was very proud of her!

After course training we started to work on the little parts. I learned how little things like my look can affect my dogs ability to read the course right. It was very rewarding to see how a little change made my dogs run really smooth and with confidence. Especially you could see the difference with Freya. If she knew the plan she jumped with good technique. But if she wasn’t sure of the plan she did duck jumps and try to correct my handling errors. Freya is so sweet when she tries to correct my mistakes and do her best to do right. I have learned so much with her but I think I will learn even more.

With Pixie my goal is to be calm, calm and calm. It is sometimes really hard because she is so forceful mover. This makes me feel a busy in my mind. I have started to trust her better and I have my moment when I can watch her do her work in peace. Actually the moments that I have no hurry have increased a lot lately. I just need to build this feeling last in every course and on every jump or task on the course. This is not an easy thing for me. It’s hard to admit that I have hard time of concentrating of total of 30 sec. I think the high speed and fast action makes my adrenaline run and my aggression high. This combination makes me a sloppy handler. I have done a lot of work to make myself more calm and present on the course. I have a constant battle with competitiveness and hunger to win. This is my biggest fault but I hope to win this battle and find my inner peace on the course. We will see how it goes! :D

Freya getting near A2

We have finally run as a team and made 2 clear runs in Rauma. Freya was a bit tired but did really good. My goal was to stop handling in careful way. I had set a goal to run as I would if she was a A3 level dog. This time the goal was set perfect and we became a confident team. Here are the videos of our two winning runs :D

I have too super agility dogs. I hope to be able become as good as handler to them as they are agility dogs.

That's all for now!!!

MPF

Obedience tasks

Box training

Freya has been working on her open class tasks for while. Our biggest trouble has been the box work. She has mixed markers of the box with the big marker object that you use in a jumping retrieve in the higher class. We have done now few box training with a toy in the box. My goal has been to remind her to go to the back of the box and not to go around a marker object on the front. I tried to shape the right position at first but this didn’t work from a long distance. I hope this works and she starts to do her box work as good as she used to.

Scent discrimination

Freya has been a little wild when she does her scent discrimination work.  She goes with fast gallop and does the smelling work wonderfully. Our problem has been that she even if she picks up the right one, she has to make checking round before she brings the right one for me. I need still built her confidence to make her bring the right stick right away to me. Her return speed has been always super but her work on sticks needs some adjusting. She has done this task in many places. It has been very interesting to see that it has been the hardest on a sand field. Freya has done her best work on grass. I have wondered if the moist in grass makes the scents even stronger and this way easier for the dog. At least with Freya it seems work like this.

Jumping retrieve with mark object

This new task in the highest class has so much fun. It has so many little parts that you need train with your dog. First you need teach the dog to go around a big marker object. Then the dog needs to learn to do sit-down- stand 2 meters after it. Next to learn how to do this between two jumps and dumbbells. Then learn to take right or left side on retrieve when asked. So lots of little things the dog learns to master.

My both girls have a little different background to start this work. Pixie has done very hard jumping retrieves and has had a very hard time to give the up the jumps. On the other hand she has trained positions by going around a tree so this part came together pretty easy. Pixie had also problems of going around the mark object and coming back because she has been thought to stop at the mark object. Freya has started everything from scratch so it has been much easier for her to learn the new concepts of the task.

At this point Pixie has done the whole task. Her only problem is the sit position. This seems to be the hardest from a top speed. Right and left commands came together pretty easy and she had no problem of going forward with same cue as in controlled retrieve. Freya has done only position and retrieves but so far so good. She has also some work with position but we are getting there. I hope to get more speed and accuracy to her work. Also we need to start tackling the jumps. All together this has been a super fun task to train and really learn to.

All for now!

MPF

Freya has start her agility carrier

It has been more than exciting to start competing with a new dog. Time has really flied and Freya has reached a competition age. We had had our up and downs but Freya has become a pretty cool agility dog. She is very light to handle and her speed just keeps improving. We have still lots of work to do. After these two competition days we a list of homework but I think we have done pretty good so far. Here videos from our first two competition days:








I love little girl!! She will be a start! We need to do some work and need remember that she is still a young dog. I sometimes forget her and trust her like she was a A3 level dog. It won't take long that she is a A3 level dog but we will have our learning moments ahead.

Just a quick note.... I have few days before go back to training a group!! I can't wait!!!

MLPF

Planning is the big part of the game

Think – Plan – Do, Bob Bailey

I have forced myself to write training diary again. My plan has been to make my training more focused and efficient. Too many times I have done just some training and realized that I haven’t been training the right things. Training diary has given me a change to be more analytic of my training and make every training count more. I have kept diary for three weeks now and it shows. Both of my dogs have advanced much quicker and our training time has been reduced a lot. I actually have got much more energy to train because I have proven record of our improvement.

One thing I have also taken under training is me. I have planned different training session just improve my mechanical skills as a trainer. Target stick training has been one the task I have done. This is a simple task for dogs but it gives me a change to improve my rewarding speed and also my accuracy with clicker. I have had a bad habit of keeping treats in my hand to speed up my rewarding. I have been determent to learn to be as fast as that when I take the treats out of my pocket.  Dog like this training and I usually use their evening meal so super treats are left for competition task training. I also use a timer in this training to keep the training session short to improve my concentration and also my dogs.

I have also started to analyze my training more during the session. I stop and write notes or even watch my training session from video. This is still a habit in training but I hope to make as every time thing. Training analyzing between different little session has help my reduce frustration in my work and also from dogs. The little time that it takes to THINK what has happened and what is the next goal (PLAN) gives me more effect to my training (DO) and better result with dog. This is something I have read many times over from training manuals and guide books to animal training. It’s just hard to change your habits. I hope that I will have strange to do this change to training and really become even better dog trainer.

As I have learned from many books and courses – training is really a mechanical skill that you need to practice. Planning of training is also a big part of the deal when you want results. I have known these things for a long time but change need time and effort to be part of life. It’s the same thing with mental training but life has really become more interesting when I have found goals that I want to work for. My goal is to improve my training and mental work. One of my treats for myself is the Clicker Expo Europe. When you have something look for you have strength to do your best! 

MLPF

It's all about Freya

Freya’s training

Agility

Freya has finally reached a competition age. Freya has super to train with. Her hardest parts have been jumping. She has done super going around the wing but her jumping cross along the bar has been a challenge. We have done a lot of jumping work to make her take off by the wing and not from the last third of bar. I don’t know how to say this problem clearly in English. But here are some pics from our jumping work and problems.

Running contacts has been our biggest job. This has been a first time I have done dog that has running A-frame and dogwalk. This project has gone pretty well. I have done our work with shaping and using a toy target.  Freya has responded to my training very well. My goal was also to do working verbal cue to turning after contact zone. This process is a still going on but she has done pretty hard stuff already. I think this will be whole life project but I like our work so far. We have done most of our work in contact obstacles so we will see how we will do on whole course.

In overall Freya is very easy to handle and she gets new stuff in just few tries. Slalom entries were done in few sessions. Her ability change her behavior after mistake is phenomenal. If she doesn’t get rewarded she stops and thinks. Usually on the next try she does it perfectly. Our lack off course work shows in our work but I think she will catch up my handling in no time.  She improves every single time. I just need to remember to reward her every time she responses exceptionally good to my handling. My bad habit is to keep running when she is doing super work. Our rhythm on course is getting better and better even though sometimes we have different routes.  :D One thing is that Freya has a very strong jump and this makes it sometimes hard predict where she will land. Good thing from this is that Freya has no problems with bars!

Obedience

What can I say? Freya is a super learner which makes obedience training super easy. She has nice high drive while we work but still she can keep mind working all the time. We have started all ob tasks that will be ahead of us. It’s been really exciting to train because our ob rules change in August. I have had even more motivation because I have had to done lots of work to new create training routines to the new tasks. I have usually tested my training plans with Pixie and then use them with Freya. I hope to built Freya as good as possible and even achieve National Champion level.

Scent discrimination training as advanced really well after I started pine cone training. This has given me change to make more repeats and improve her skills in more difficult situations. Pine cone training has also stopped her from lifting the wrong ones and improved her scent work even more. I have been so thrilled how she works with her nose. I think our Nosework work has also given her more confident in her scent work. Soon we will start to put this all together as a competition task

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Freya’s heel work and sit-down-stand in heel work has been really good. I actually could do heel work with her all the time. Freya has really good energy and very nice contact. Her position work in heeling has becoming better and better. I do lots work sit-down-stand outside to healing to improve her cue discrimination. As I wrote before our next goal is to make her stand without turning her head. I have used a treat target at this point. My plan is to start training her with Z-walk with mark cones. I will test what she likes if I have sometimes a toy behind the mark cone so she would have front target. This will probably keep her from turning around when go behind her. At first this might lower her speed and accuracy when I built the reward but hope it will improve the total outcome.

That’s a little bit about Freya. She has been just a perfect girls scout in training (saying in Finnish). I couldn’t ask for a better training partner! Thank you Jane!

MLPF   

Why do I want to become a WC in agility?

Why do I want to become a WC in agility?

This is a very good question.  I have always wanted to be world champion in agility but never thought why.  What is my real motivation to reach this goal? I took a little while to answer this. My first thought to get fame to my dog. This is really a very shallow purpose because this really doesn’t matter to my dog. Other thing is to challenge myself to become super good at something.  I am also a patriot so hope that my dog can bring honor to my country. These reasons did raise some feelings but not very strong ones. I really got the strongest feeling of becoming the best agility handler.

So how do you become a best agility handler? I need at least 10 000 hours of training. This has been scientifically proved that you need 10 000 practice hours to become excellent in something. Of course people have some skills that can give first advantage in the beginning of carrier but to become excellent in something you need practice, practice and practice. So I have trained now 10 years agility but I haven’t done my job so intensive that I could say have done work worth of 10 000. I have done this my first years with more emotion than really analytical way. So if we got to the National Team we would really need luck to reach it. I haven’t done my “homework” well enough to say that I’m excellent in agility.

My next goal is to change my training and my other life to support more my goal. I have started to write training diary again and also I plan my training session ahead. I want to get the maximum effect from the training each time and analyze my training from videos. I also know that I can learn more agility by training other so it’s time for me to go back to training other teams. I can train with my dogs only a certain amount but I can repeat my skills every time I teach them to someone. Also from teaching other I can see things what dogs don’t know how to do or get a new idea in training when I have solve a problem of my student. Altogether I need to step up my act to reach my ultimate goal. This thinking has given me a lot of more motivation. I have seen better what I can do better to become what I want. It will be a never ending story but this beginning has too sloppy to really take where I wanted. 

Jukka Pätynen / Koirakuvat

Thoughts after National Team Tryouts

I wrote this blog post before I went to National Team tryout. Pixie did the same mistake she did last year and jumped A-frame contact. This was really a thing I didn't like. She has done 2on2off contacts very well in the last competitions and she never makes this mistake in training. So I was really disappointed to her work. She just got too much steam in her head to make it well. We will see if we can fix her drive issues in big competitions. I was happy of my work in the course. I was calm and kept the contact to her. I know her problems come from the running contact training and I'm not sure can I fix her to be a dog that I can trust on the course. I have had to "fix" our problems too much. I haven't enjoyed competing the whole year. Well in jumping we have had our moments but I hope we will get the same feeling to agility runs.


That's for know.. Soon update of Freya.. She has reached competition age!!!!!

MLPF

Obedience update

Obedience training with Freya

Freya and I missed the National Team championships because she started finally her first heat. Since then we have been working on all ob tasks coming ahead in a higher classes. My goal has been to work little part at the time and make them as good as possible. I have also tried to work with her in different places to make variation skills better. Still lot of work to do but she is ready start competing with the new rules in August.

Distance Control

One big project has been distance control. I have done series of training in pair of two changes (sit-stand, stand-laying down, laying down –sit).  I have done this to keep the technique in super shape. Now I have started to take distance more and more. It comes slowly together but I like the quality of her work. I hope to build up her confidence and speed in small pieces. We will see how this goes. Freya is much faster than Pixie but her staying in one place is the hardest part.

"Square"

Square has had it challenges. At this point I have been able to make her find a right place and run in to the square from various distances. Her stop has been little too slow. This we have worked with Tarja’s constructions where I send Freya to a target mat and stop her before she reaches it. This has made her stops faster and she turns right away towards me. We still need some repeats to get this super stop integrate to the square task.  After we have succeeded in this we have nice and fast square.

Z-walk

Sit-Down-Stand in movement has becoming nicely together. I have shaped each movement separately in different positions around me. Then I have done them during heal work. Freya handles now all three of the positions but we need to work more in different places and I have to start training her between mark cones as you have to do in Z-walk. Freya has pretty nice speed to reach to cues and she holds the positions nicely when I walk behind her. I need to change her focus more to the front so that her position looks more steady and firm. So some work with front reward and that should be fixed. I don’t want her to turn her head when I go behind her.

All together Freya has been super to work with. She is very focused, high driven and very fast learner. What more can you ask from a ob dog? She has so good working attitude that she makes me work better and she makes me smile every time and Freya smiles all the time. I think we will have a super obedience carrier and lots of wild memories.  Just love this little girl <3 <3 <3 <3

For next time I try to make videos of all our work..

MLPF