MeiLi & Devyn’s Training

MeiLi struggled with the weaves as the gates were nearby and I was trying to work on a rear cross entry. It took a while be she finally got it. The rest of the first run was very nice. The second I did a blind cross entry and while not clean it was better. I think we know what our homework is for the next few weeks. We did get a short turn after the first two course runs to work just on weaves. It went pretty well.

Today was a good day for MeiLi. The first run went very well other than my attempt at a rear cross weave entry. The handling on the second run made more sense for her. There were treats all around the arena that caused us some focus issues.

After a weekend of trialing, I really expected a tired and unfocused dog today. I was pleasantly surprised with a focused and driven pup instead. This was a very fun class day. I think the Blue dog is figuring out the benefits of playing with me.

This weekend was a MeiLi trial weekend while we did another round of trial secretary work. I was very happy to get to play with her as the rest of the weekend was super stressful. Anyways I am not going to break down each run at this point but here they are. I was most proud of our Snooker Level 2 perfect 51 on Sunday. I was so proud of MeiLi on this one. It felt so good going for the 51 again.

Just a little more of our training at home.

A nice day at class with the blue dog.

Blue dog in her class. She struggles with weaves in this class but I think it is because the gates are always near the weaves and worries her. She never did weaves using those, so she doesn’t get why they are there.

This was one of our runs from the 3D Dog Training Pink trial on April 1, 2023

Another class day

This was a fun little jumpers course.

A standard course. Working on those contacts.

Today’s class was a total blast. Betsi had a super challenging course set up, clearly over our abilities. Every individual challenge we could do there were just so many of them. We only had three dogs in class today and they all did well, so we managed to get 4 runs in each. I was very pleased with how MeiLi did. She is having some dog walk issues and some commitment issues but is staying focused on me and happy to work. Each of the four runs is follows. Despite it being the least successful I was thrilled with the third run as she remained focused on me even when my classmate came out to give me clean up supplies. The first run she was turning wide and over running things. She was also very confused by the tunnel under the dog walk. The second round I decided to use the other end of the tunnel under the dogwalk and that seemed to help her a whole bunch. She also gave me better turns and did well with the weaves. The third run she was clearly distracted, and then ended up peeing in the ring. I was super proud that she stayed with me and did not react to supplies being brought out to me and stayed with me while I did the clean-up. She then finished the run well. The final run I changed things up. First going back to the end of the tunnel she had issues with the first run and then changing the direction I turned her at both wrap jumps. While she did touch the dogwalk on the way to tunnel 8 she did try hard to figure out what I wanted and recovered quickly. I really liked the turn before the Frame as I felt she really stayed engaged with me. Overall, a very good class. MeiLi is really working with me and not falling for all the distractions she used to react too. Next week we are off before starting a new set.

CLASS videos

One run from this class.

Today was another good training day for MeiLi. We got three turns on this fun course, and she was able to complete my planned course each time. No video of the first run but we did get the second two. She was very focused and did not react to the other dogs at all. The gate was open on one of the runs and she ran out of the ring but returned to me when I called her which is HUGE! She gave me a good start line on two of the three runs. I was very proud of the first since we had just come into the building when it was our turn. She was very excited coming in but still managed to focus. She even got to play some “Go See” with Betsi rewarding her for visiting and me calling her back. She was able to set up at the start jump while the other students removed the gates at the weaves. She continues to struggle with tight turns and commitment to obstacles but that is understandable since she has never really run with obstacles at full spacing and a full head of steam. I mixed things up a little bit on each course just to make sure she was listening to me. On the last run she developed some issues doing the dogwalk. I am hoping that is just a temporary setback as we have done very little contact work. But it is something to keep an eye on. We are so enjoying our class.