Saturday morning obedience class

This is the first time in a month that we've been able to make it to the private invite-only Saturday morning class with the CD and CDX handlers and dogs. And just so you can put a face with a name while watching the videos, my obedience/rally mentor (and the one who invited Red and I to join this training group), Michelle, is the tall one in the pink sweatshirt with the Soft-Coated Wheaten Terrier named Mazie. Mazie has all her Rally titles (RN, RA, RE) and her CD. They are currently working toward her CDX in Open classes. Michelle will be going with Red and I to our Rally trial on Oct 31st for moral support, and to man the video camera =)

Red was very excited to be back with the training group this morning and did a really good job. I had hotdog bits, and his tennis ball for rewards. I used the hotdog bits for rewards during certain exercises, and the tennis ball for rewards after the exercise was finished. He seemed to really respond to using both of these rewards.

The first exercise is a heeling warm-up. The group heels around the room while someone calls out instructions for halts, turns, and other exercises. This one lasted for about 10 minutes. I used hot dog bits very sparingly. It seems like if I use treats in the middle of heeling, he puts his head down to swallow and then loses focus and starts forging ahead of me. So I didn't treat much except after the sit/stay, down/stay, stand/stay exercises, and it seemed to work pretty well. He was crowding me a bit through a lot of the heeling, which he usually doesn't, but the heeling still wasn't horrible. His attention was really good though. Here's the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tAsdJdhts4

The next thing is usually Figure 8's. Which unforunately I didn't get a video of, because naturally it was Red's best Figure 8 performance to date. He did really well this time! Usually he's not very focused and is slow on the halt-sits, but this time even the people I was working with commented on how well he did. I'm bummed I didn't get a video, but oh well, maybe next time.

Then we do the 3 minute sit/stay, and 5 minute down/stay. No video of this since it would be boring to watch. About half the group went out of sight since for the CDX exercise, and the other half stayed in sight for the CD exercise. I didn't go clear to the other end of the room like some of the CD handlers did, but probably about 20 feet away. I am still weaning him off my return/rewards for longer stretches of time. About halfway through on the sit/stay, before the first return/reward, he went into a down. I returned to him, put him back into a sit, then left him again. I returned once to reward after that, then the exercise was finished. So other than that one mistake, he did okay for that - his attention was really good and he didn't fidget very much. The down/stay was even better. Usually he sits in a sphinx-like crouch, but this time he rolled onto a hip and laid so good! I returned to him to quietly reward 3 times within the 5 minutes, and then the exercise was finished. I was really happy with this one because he seemed very relaxed, had great focus, didn't fidget, and didn't act like he was thinking about getting up at any point during the excerise. I think the rolling onto a hip really helped - I've heard people say they've trained their dog to do this instead of sitting the whole time in a sphinx-down, but I haven't trained Red to do that yet, he just did it on his own this time. Anyway, these long sits/downs have given me a lot of grief in the past, but I think we are making tremendous headway, and I was very proud of how Red did today.

After that we did the formal recalls. I usually treat after he sits in front of me, but after today I realized I need to stop doing that, because he comes in nice and straight, and then when he sees me getting ready to treat, he moves to the side in anticipation to accept the treat. You can see what I mean when you watch the video. So I'm going to stop doing that, and just let him front and finish, then reward. Here's the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CO6tf92m3wk

After that, it's sort of a free-for-all. The CDX crew sets up jumps and broad jumps and they do work with the dumbbells. During this time, I usually play with Red and do a few random exercises, but mostly just play. Because by this point he'd losing motivation for focus so I try to keep him interested in me with a toy. I got caught in conversation with a fellow handler with her 9 month old (170 lb) Mastiff from our intermediate class, and Red was the best boy - he sat there on my left side, intently STARING at me the entire time - for like 10 minutes straight! I was feeding him bits of hotdog to reward him for such excellent attention during the chat. What a good boy =) After the chat, I got down on the floor and rough-housed with him as a special reward for being such a good boy while I chatted. He got the zoomies and almost ploughed me over a couple times, completely losing his mind and licking my whole entire face and ears. I didn't care though because he was using this play-energy on me rather than trying to do it with the other dogs.

All in all, it was a successful morning! I really wish we could do this every week - I actually requested more Saturdays off per month so we can attend. We will be going next Saturday too, so I'm happy about that! =)