I'm painfully aware when I do seminars that much of what I teach flies in the face of so-called "conventional wisdom". But the "systems" that are being taught these days are systems for fast high-drive border collies. That's completely understandable because these guys are winning national championships, getting on the world team, and generally kicking everybody's butt in competition.

Many people will fail or languish in a second tier class by trying to use a handling system designed by a fast high-drive border collie... when their dogs aren't actually fast high-drive border collies.

I am highly suspicious of "flavor of the week" training. For example, every two or three months the handler/trainer might read an article in Clean Run about some new hoity toity contact training method. So, because their contacts aren't perfect, they dump their old system and pick up a new system. And in a couple months another article comes out and they dump the system they'd newly adopted and try yet something else. Then, before you know it, the dog who had a happy and graceful performance of the A-frame though maybe misses the down contact 1 in 8 times... has a dreadful slow performance, acts confused, gives refusals... and still misses the down contact 1 in 8 times.

I'm very aware when I'm out in the world teaching that I'm introducing something new (hoity toity??) and may contradict the system teaching to which many handlers have been exposed. And I will tell people that if what they are doing is working, then it is right; (though very often I can show them something that works better, smarter, and faster.)

You should note that I am a handler trainer; and that is the focus of my seminar work. Don't get me wrong, if we have to talk about dog training, if we have to do dog training exercises, then we will do. But my focus has ever been teaching the handler to step up to be a member of the team to understand what his 50% of the work is... and how to do it. We must also recognize that there are dogs of a type and that the system the handler uses for his dog would be appropriate for that type of dog. There is no such thing as "one-size-fits-all" in agility. Systems for fast high-drive dog... will only fit fast high-drive dogs.

Playing Around #1

Boy oh boy oh boy! When you put up the teacup equipment with challenges comparable to what the big fast dogs face in the big dog venues... it looks very scary. I note when we do these technical exercises we’ll have a fairly high success rate; somewhere in the 70% range. Americans do everything the hard way! And, we're good at it.

It's interesting to note, in this exercise that the most common fault is at jump #4 because the handler doesn't step up as the dog comes out of the pipe tunnel[1] to help create the approach to jump #4. Indeed, we will have the same error at jump #6.

To back up a sec, I also use this exercise to teach the vee-set opening. I remind my students that the handler is the architect of the dog's path. The handler doesn't really have to accept a corner on the landing side of jump #2 because putting the corner between jumps #1 and #2 creates a smarter path, completely taking the dummy jump out of the picture.

I also often have to teach handlers how to use counter rotation (the old RFP) to draw the dog to the closer obstacle when in the body magnet position on a discrimination problem. The fun thing about the TDAA is that the handler had better be spot on with his timing because the action is coming fast and furious.

Playing Around #2

If I really have to make a point about the power of counter rotation (the RFP) this is an excellent exercise to do it. I specify to my students that they must make the approach to jump #3 with dog on right ostensibly for a Back Cross or Tandem Turn at jump #3. The handler should take the control position (right on the plane of the dummy jump) then counter rotate and face and move the dog off to his left, and then Cross back when the dogs nose gets to the plane of the jump which is the first moment that the dog is clear of the dummy jump.