Raising a Riot

Handling 2 Week 4

Riot and I had a pretty decent night in class. We had some pretty amazing leadouts tonight and I got some decent distance on him too. He was very driven and worked well for his tug.

For our first sequence (white squares), I tried two different leadouts. First the blue blob facing towards him. He swung wide and didn’t read the turn very well with that one. The second one I tried was the purple blob facing jump 2. I took maybe a step forward with a front cross to 3. He read that one very well and handled the distance beautifully.

The next sequence I tried the lead out push from the orange blob. First attempt he went around jump number one and took jump number 2. Tried again, releasing him with “bar” instead of “okay” and he took jumps 1 and 2. My front cross between 4 and 5 was up too far and drove him wide which made 5 to 6 awkward and had me further ahead of him than I wanted to be so I added a poorly executed FC between 6 and 7. Even if I had timed it, better I still would have preferred to be on the other side of 7.

Elsie had me do the second sequence again with the way I had planned the ending so I decided to try a more difficult lead out and started at the green blob facing jump 3. I moved right and again had a very drive-y front cross between 4 and 5 that ended up pushing him over 6. Elsie had me do it again and it was much better. I still traveled with my front cross (I always do), but it was better and Riot took a much better line. Both times the leadout was great. I’m loving the distance I’m getting on this dog and the lead outs I’m able to do with him.

* all blobs are approximations

Practicing Weaves

I realized that since Riot has learned his weaves and we dropped the contact and weaves class we haven’t done a lot of weave pole training. Since the last thing I want to do is have to relearn the weaves, we worked on them in short sessions all weekend.

I’ve only worked him maybe twice outside of class since we learned them and what I observed the last time was he was having issues with collection once there was a jump placed in front of the poles. I had planned on working on this with him this weekend, but we seemed to be having other problems. We’re having completion problems, but it’s not the same problem every time. I think a lot of it had to do with the poles not being staked down and moving on him. And that the base of our poles is the old style with the T on both end and not the new akc style. I think of lot of what was throwing him off was hitting that base today.

I moved the weave poles a few feet at one point today in hoping to find flatter ground with hopefully less wobble. When I moved them, the first set was overlapping the second by a good inch (that was all Riot’s doing). I think with more repetition, he’ll get more consistent. At this point I don’t want to do anything to discourage him because I like the speed I’m getting out of him.

We need to practice more, but I think I’m going to have to start staking down the poles (ugh) and may even need to consider getting another set of weaves. Chris is gonna love both those things.

Our First Rally Advanced Trial

Riot competed in the advanced rally class for the first time today. We drove up to PA this morning to the Dauphin Dog Training Club for their Rally Trial.

I’ve been working a lot of hours so we haven’t been practicing as much as we should have been so I wasn’t sure what to expect. I pulled Riot out really early. So we could practice some before hand and get his focus on me. Riot can be a crazy spaz when I first get him out, but once he understands we’re working he settles down quite nicely. I also start working him away from distractions and gradually move him closer and closer. So we started warming up outside and eventually moved inside. Once we got inside he was doing a really nice job focusing on me for the most part. since we had been in there a while and they were still on the B class, we went for a nice little walk. Then we came back in and did some more warming up. I had him in a down-stay while they presented ribbons for the B class. I worked him a little bit more and then asked if he was ready. His eyes lit up and he barked at me. Whoops… fortunately no one was in the ring.

I think this was my first mistake. We were dog number 10 in the ring in the A class and after that, he was ready. I alternated warming him up and leaving him in a down while we waited. We moved over near the start gate 3 dogs before our turn. He was doing really well until the dog ahead of him walked over and then he was all over sniffing.

He was so excited by the time we got into the ring. I just love his attitude. But I knew because he had such a hard time sitting next to me at the startline, we were going to be in for a wild ride.

I was off at the first sign and started to do a 360° Right instead of Left. From that point on, I was a bit frazzled and I think Riot picked up on that. He had some great heeling and some really bad heeling throughout the course.

The second sign was a halt. Call Dog Front Finish Right Halt. One of the exercises we haven’t practiced much. He did a really nice job. His front wasn’t as straight as I’d have liked, but not bad.

Obstacle number three was a 90° pivot. I always forget that exercise is in advanced. He did a pretty decent job.

The next 6 obstacles were really nice. A Left Turn. A Halt Fast Forward From Sit. Normal Pace. Right Turn. 270° Left (this was a little messy). And a Call Front Finish Right Forward.

Then came the Halt Stand Walk Around Dog. Riot does not have a good stand. We work on it in spurts, but he’s not reliable with it. He’s been doing it since he was 6 months too. The first two times we attempted this exercise, he did a down — I get a down or a stand and then an immediate sit about half the time we practice, but he had been doing really well this past week. Finally the third time, we got the stand.

We followed this with a Left Turn and a Sit.

Then came the 270° Right. Which we did pretty well, until I got confused thinking it was supposed to be 360° so around we went again.

The last two were the jump and a Moving Side Step Right which were fine.

Then the steward holding the leash decided that she needed to body block the energetic golden to keep him from leaving the ring which excited him. She kept telling me to hurry up and leash him while grasping my leash with both hands. It was way more chaotic than it needed to be. He motions were getting Riot all excited. I finally got him in a down and my leash from her so I could get him leashed. If I wasn’t already frazzled enough….

We ended up with a 76. The lowest score of the 5 dogs who didn’t NQ. I think my mental mistakes probably cost us as many if not more points that Riot’s antics.

Overall I really can’t complain. We were in the ring off leash with plenty of distractions around. Considering the hours I’ve been working (I wasn’t sure at 11 o’clock the night before if I was going to be able to go or if I was going to have to skip out and work), I was not prepared as well mentally as I needed to be. I also didn’t walk the course as many times as I usually do or with as much attention — this was the largest rally walkthrough we’ve had.

Handling 2 Week 2

Have I mentioned I love this dog? Right now he’s curled up next to me on the couch but earlier tonight he was a rock star in his agility class.

He’s a young male and I think he acts that way, but despite that, he’s really coming along nicely. His jumping was complemented tonight. Both for good form and for being a quiet jumper.

We’re still having lots of distractions, but he always comes back to me. His leash is a HUGE distraction. Diann ended up holding his leash so we could get through the sequences. She did give us some good tips for curing this leash issue.

All of the sequences tonight were grid exercises which in a lot of ways I find more challenging than other sequences. We did front and rear crosses, a two jump lead out push, a 270° turn with a tunnel distraction in the middle, a few pinwheels, and a few 180s.

Tonight was very distracting for Riot. I usually put him in a down stay between his turns on the far side of the building. Tonight we were on the far side of the building second and it seems like the more courses he does, the more amped he tends to get. He was holding his down stays, but barely for the first sequence on the far side. For the second, we were behind the tunnel and Riot kept sitting up when I was walking the sequence and setting bars. He was okay for the border collie, but waiting for the other two goldens to have their turn was torture. He was whining and kept sitting up. I’m thinking the sitting was to see over the tunnel and see what was going on. By the time it was his last turn he was so ready. I asked if he was ready and he barked at me.

We’ve been working weaves and teeter all week too. He needs to learn collection on the weaves. He was missing between poles 2 and 3 maybe 20-30% of the time.

"holy crap"

Riot had his first class of this session tonight. He’s taking handling 2 again. I probably could have moved him up to handling 3, but I think the sequences in handling 2 are still plenty challenging (usually taken from AKC Open or USDAA Advanced courses) and we can still learn a lot — heck, even Cisco has taken this class again on occasion to work on handling.

We have one border collie in our group this time. There is also one terrier, and then 3 goldens and a poodle. Riot at the BC we competing to see who could move the tunnel the most.

We had 4 runs tonight. The first one went pretty well until he noticed the other group working on the other side and then he stopped right in front of a jump and watched them. He was very interested in what was going on, but I easily got his attention and he worked really well for me from there on out. The first sequence he finished with an extra tunnel and jump. The second sequence was picture perfect and I called him off the tunnel he was getting ready to take after we were finished. Normally I’d let him take the tunnel, but I wanted to see if he’d call off and sure enough, he did. On our way back to get his leash, he tackled the weave poles along the wall.

The next two sequences were a little more difficult. We started with slicing a jump and the angles of all the jumps were skewed. Our first time through I was not far enough ahead of Riot and wasn’t able to push him out to the middle jump in the pinwheel. Our second attempt, I thought I was prepared, but he took off even faster than the first time. So my reaction besides having to speed up myself was to exclaim “holy crap.” Yeah, that dog can move. Despite being caught off guard with the speed, we did the sequence quite well.

Our last sequence of the night was the toughest. The opening was the same, but varied after the first two obstacles. A slight hesitation on my part resulted in Riot taking obstacles 3 and 4 from the previous sequence. I think it’s going to be very easy to get off courses with Riot — if I don’t make the next obstacle clear, he’s taking whatever is in front of him (which saved me earlier in the evening when I was lost). Our second attempt at the sequence was near perfect.

Right now our problem is I’m still babying him. We’re in this place where I think he knows more than I think he does, but not as much as I think he does. The more we work the better it’ll get. I’m having so much fun running him.

Oh and I got what I’d consider an awesome compliment from Elsie. She said she’d like to pair Robber and Riot in USDAA pairs.

22"

Riot got measured this weekend at the HVGRC agility trial. He now has his temporary height card saying he’s 22” tall. Yay for just barely being able to jump 20”

Contacts Practice

Our contacts are coming along. I took the boys over to ACA to work contacts for a little while this afternoon. Riot nailed all of his contacts in his first working session.

After I worked Cisco, and brought Riot out for his second session, he was a bit more amped. I wrapped him around a jump and he took the dog walk without me giving him a command. He completely blew off the contact. I’m not sure if it was him being amped or the fact I didn’t say “walk-it” that caused him to blow it off. The next time around, he again stopped a little short of the bottom. Over compensation of before? Other than that he hit all his contacts the second session. I also upped the jump to 22 and 24 inches on him and he didn’t have any problems with that either.

Like always, eventually things seem to come together with Riot. It’s not necessarily that I need to fix things with him. It’s more I think he needs to understand and sort it out in his own head.

I’m looking forward to seeing how he does on a standard course. There are a few run throughs in November I’m going to try and take him to to get him used in running different environments.

Last Night of Classes

Last night was Riot’s last Contacts & Weaves and Handling 2 Classes.

Contacts and Weaves

In contacts and weaves we practiced measuring since I (along with a few others) requested practice. Fortunately Riot should probably measure under 22 inches. We were getting between 21.5” and 22.25” depending on how wiggly and relaxed he was. He is taller than I thought he was going to be, but not as tall as I feared he was last week.

He had some nice grid work. And his weaves were pretty good. Elsie had us doing a set of 10 followed by a set of 6 and vice versa. We didn’t get a chance to do any teeter work, but we’ve been working the newly resurfaced teeter in the basement some this week.

As for his contacts, they’re getting better. They’re actually looking really nice when I’m on the left. He’s still not driving into position from the right that has everyone scratching their heads.

Handling 2

For handling 2, we did a novice jww course last night. It was the first full course Riot has seen. Riot didn’t do too bad. We had some issues with the lead out (I think more handler than dog related). And Riot broke his start line stay for the first time. I’m pretty please with the way he did.

We’re taking Handling 2 again next session. It’s a really fun class and we get to work on some pretty challenging sequences.

Class Week 5

In Contacts and Weaves we spent a lot of time dissecting his contacts problem. He’s got a great dog walk and teeter when he’s on the left, but on the right, he’s stopping a few feet short of the bottom. Eventually we got him driving to the bottom. The a-frame he was more hesitant on than usual. He was pausing at the top and driving towards the edges on his way down. Overall I was very happy with our progress tonight. We also did some practice on our weaves. I layered a second set of weaves between the poles he was working and myself and he stayed in. We also did a bunch of practice on the tire while we were waiting our turn. I was getting some very nice distance on that too.

Next was our handling 2 class and the sequences were from last weekend’s open or excellent jumpers run. Riot did really well. I made a handling mistake on the end of our first sequence and then he was not trilled about repeating and things kind of fell apart. Our second sequence I had thrown the leash in a place that I thought would be out of the way, but Riot did the first two jumps and decided to bring me the leash. He was fixated on the jump with the rest of our attempts with that sequence.

The next one we did fairly well, he lost focus between two of the jumps, but I called his name and got him right back on track. I got extra tickets for doing a good job of keeping my eye on the dog and keeping moving.

Our last sequence we nailed. We did it as a distance exercise and Riot had no problems with it.

Tonight there was a double and a triple in our sequences. This was the first time he had seen either and there weren’t any problems with them.

Our Weekend Off

We had no dog events this weekend and nothing planned.

It was mostly a low key weekend, but we worked the teeter and did some board work on Saturday and today we threw some bumpers. For a dog that doesn’t always want to bring them back, he sure does have a love for the game.

Up until now I’ve thrown only three bumpers and quit with Riot as not to overdo it. Tonight, since he was so wired and amped up for the game, we did 7 (and he’d probably have done more if I let him). He brought back all 7 much closer than he usually does and even hand delivered 3!

Riot also is responsible for recycling our plastic bottles. We’ll hand them to him and he’ll happily cary them into the kitchen for us. I need to get him some place to put them, but for now we take them back from him. Today, I decided to see what would happen if I told him to sit. He’d immediately spit out the bottle and sat.

I’m looking forward to force fetching him… well, maybe not the process, but the result.