Dog Handling

DOG SPORTS ROTORUA UPDATE

Dog Sports Rotorua is growing up. We have quite a number of people currently competing at Agility or about to become competitors. I have been coaching hard the last three years and at last we have people staying the distance and becoming involved in the Sport and the running of the Club. This is very gratifying for me. As Sue Thomas says ' You must be over the moon'. And I am.

However, as I have said many times it is not possible to go on Coaching and running classes for the senior mob forever. For starters they are all getting to the point where they have heard it all before, they are starting to get their own styles and ideas and of course I have taken money in lessons for the last couple of years which has resulted in them all being just about as good as I am.

In order for the Club to go forward and continue to grow I need to bring more people in at the bottom end and I need to be part of a group that allows me to grow in the Sport of Agility as well, before I am too old and grey to enjoy it anymore, which sometimes I feel is fast approaching.

I have set up a group of three of us as the beginning of a Peer Group of Agility Seniors. The code of this group must be:

• To put others before Self • To treat every Club Member as your equal • To get alongside up and coming Agility Teams and bring them into Senior Space; and • To Promote the Sport of Agility in our District.

In order to achieve this we need to be the sort of people that others can admire, without it going to our heads and ruining a real opportunity to add strength to Dog Sports as a Club.

My view as a part of the group, is that it is my responsibility to bring AD level classes to the larger Agility Group so that they understand the qualification and have something to aim for. I have suggested that we challenge ourselves by setting up Jumpers B type courses and Novice Intermediate level courses as well. Obviously these are not going to suit everyone and obviously until people have their weaves in place they probably won't get a lot from this level of course. I am convinced though that if good Beginner Agiliteers come to a couple of these courses and are encouraged to try some of the work on hand, that they will grow in their ambition to be part of a group that can work well at this level. There is no point in doing the same old same old, never pushing boundaries, never trying new stuff.

Sometimes you will hear the word 'over faced' being used as a way of saying 'so and so should not be doing work at that level with that dog, they are not ready'. And I agree that there is always a danger that exposing people to work they have never seen can make them feel like underachievers rather than ambitious beginners. This is where having a responsive and responsible Peer Group can take a hand.

Let’s say we introduce a person who is just weaving to a good quality Novice Course. There will be parts of that course that the person understands and parts that just blow their mind. First we have to get them to identify the parts of the course they do understand completely and let them build confidence on those bits.

They may need to try just the weaves in isolation because the weave entry is a bit more than they can push themselves to try. They may not feel confident on a particular contact piece, so encourage them to leave that stuff alone. When they have taken their turns and done all the stuff they know, then one of the Group gets together with them to build confidence on down contact work to help them understand and enforce running contacts with a stop at the bottom. Move them through the steps they need to take to understand right and left weave entries and show them how they might attack the serpentine hurdle set, of which Alex Jones and Shadroc are the Serpentine Champs.

After about ten minutes of this stuff and making sure they are confidence with their starts, the new team should have enough information to tackle the course on a lower than standard hurdle height. If it turns to custard that’s okay but I will guarantee if the beginner Agiliteer feels that they are treasured and believed in, then they will surprise themselves, their dog and all around them. This is the way I coach and this is the way that I want the Senior Group to work with other Club members.

The cost of all of this is absolutely nothing, it is part of mentoring Club Members to achieve and help us grow Agility. It is a Club service offered to those who we can see are showing all the signs of a successful career in our Sport. It is also an opportunity to help some Club members to Specialise in Jumpers. Jumpers Dogs are born not made. We really only have two up and coming at the Club at the moment. For them the Weaves are irrelevant, what we want to do is expose them to Jumpers courses to help them keep up their speed. Of course the rest of us will want to 'have a go' at Jumpers and even compete, but true Jumpers Champions are fast stylish crazy dogs whose response to their handling is obscenely good.

So that is the Club project getting off the ground at the moment. Alex Jones has researched good quality plans and is starting to put bits together for us. I want to do an AD at 3p.m. on Saturday29th August (after Club day) which I will issue invitations to Club members to come and have a go at if they are very close to weaving. I need practice with Becki boo anyway as she has one AD, Chris and Boston have one AD and Alex and Shadroc have one also. Some of the others need to see if they can beat us. Although I am encouraging most people to get their Starters wins under their belt before doing ADs there are special circumstances where I would recommend ADs as soon as possible.

This Peer Group have to be leaders for our Agility Team and work with everyone at the Club who has ambition to be as good as they can be in their chosen Sport. The Group consists of Raewyn, Alex and Debbie at present. We will be very keen to add others as achievements happen along the way.

WHAT IS HAPPENING THROUGH THIS COLD WINTER

CANINE GOOD CITIZEN
12 dogs and their handlers are meeting every second Friday night from 6p.m. to 7p.m. in the old Clubhouse up the top of the hill (a BIG THANKYOU to the Stockcar Club for their generosity in loaning us the use of the old Clubhouse) to work our way through the tests and see if we can be ready to sit them on 12th September at Rotorua Dog Obedience Club.

It is just amazing how our dogs have come on and lost some of their nerves and gained such a lot of confidence while doing this set of tests. All of us are noticing the huge changes. We have had lots of friendly strangers come and be part and handle and surprise our dogs as well. If you would like to be a friendly stranger and help us to train please contact Raewyn, we would love to have you. I have been training Fae the Fat Fairy in this group and she is really into it.

After 12th September we will be starting another Foundation Group and hopefully running a Bronze group for our successful dogs from this upcoming test day. If you would like to join us doing CGC please let Raewyn know as well as I think probably 10 dogs to the class is enough and there will be some from this class who are not yet ready to do the test and will probably continue to prepare so that they can sit some time later in the year.

WEAVES CLASS.
Through the last summer we had a series of Weaves Clinics which resulted in only three people getting to weave properly although I worried that the weaving was very tentative and unsure on the part of both the handler and the dog. For too long we have relied on standing in the right place to get the entry to the weave, trying to close down weaves and the wheels falling off the whole thing. I have personally never had too much trouble teaching my dogs to weave, however, I am prepared to admit that the dogs' confidence in the weaves has taken far too long to get right. Anyway I have developed a system that to me will mean that the dogs have far greater confidence and will enter and exit properly and complete 12 weaves. It is looking pretty good.

At the moment we have a group who do weaves at 1p.m. every Saturday either indoors or outdoors. This will continue until 1st September when a class called 'Chippy's Weave Class' will begin. Again it is $50 for 11 lessons. It will be time for me to shut Chip's weaves down and move him on to Agility. The current group are welcome to continue to meet then and put the finishing touches to their weaves and I will help, but the new group will have my full attention. We have some smashing dogs coming along at the moment and I am so looking forward to getting them weaving.

AGILITY SENIOR PEER GROUP.
The weather has somewhat halted progress of this group at present. I am planning an AD course on 29th August. If you think you would like to try it please let me know. Alex is working on more Jumpers B courses which may be on a Monday night but she will let you know and it is weather permitting. I am sure Debbie will be looking forward to putting up a Novice course in the near future too.

NALA
Club Nala is now one of our really big events days. All Club members are welcome to come and help set up and bring their food to add to our catering for lunch. It starts at about 11a.m. and finishes about 3 p.m.

CLUB AGILITY
Club Agility afternoons on Saturday (see upcoming events further on) is for everyone. There can be a course for under 12 month olds, Learners, Elementary and Experienced Agiliteers and now we have 'Sprint' which is absolutely for everyone. It costs $4 and is a great learning curve for all.