8:36 PM
| Sunrise at | 8:09 AM | in direction | 98° | East |  |
| Sunset at | 7:09 PM | in direction | 261° | West |  |
Aria and I have been in agility training together without progressing very much for a while now. This is our 4th Fall going into classes for agility. We have not been in class both fall and spring for various reasons. The first year we were in the fall class and making progress, but we tried to breed her in the spring. We then could have restarted Fundamentals I, but missed the slot and took random classes here and there. We were able to get into the second semester of Fundamentals that spring. The following fall, we started again in novice. We missed several classes due to Gary's illness and my mother's situation. As we were just getting our stride, and ready for spring, that class was cancelled because it conflicted with something else in the barn where we train. We took the class this summer, and we made good progress, but they deemed us not ready to advance to Intermediate and we are repeating the entire novice year again.
On Thursday, our first class, I found myself wondering if we would EVER get passed novice. We did really well at the onset. Our task was to come out of a tunnel, do two jumps and return. She followed beautifully. Then our task was to not go to the second jump but return. She followed beautifully. Finally we needed to change entries into the tunnel and intersperse all of that with going to the table or doing one or two jumps. She did all of it wonderfully.
Then we had three jumps in a row. She took the first, went around the second and jumped the third. She did that several times - very weird. We stopped at two and she jumped both. Finally, we moved back up to three and she did fine. Then again I was to stop at the second jump and she responded. Not going forward because I am not going forward does not appear to be the issue. Getting her to go on is the issue.
Finally we had a tunnel and one jump and she and I did every combination every direction we could think of and she did them all wonderfully. We were ready for our final run through of the evening. First several jumps and tunnels were fine. Then she knocked off a bar in a big jump and following that failed to negotiate a pin wheel. I remember that same type of turn was our Waterloo in our very first fundamentals class. You are blasting out of several jumps and then suddenly want her to make a turn to the right. I was too far ahead of her and she missed it - and went under it. Then we could not get her to jump it from the angle to matter where I started. Then I finally set her up to look at it straight on and she did fine and went to the weaves. She missed one the first time but second time was fine and completed the course with no problem.
Everyone thought if I'd been more smooth she would have made that turn. Or if I hadn't gotten so far ahead of her she would have made it or ... it is really easy to criticize another person isn't it? The question was what would you like to have done better? Apparently everyone had some strong ideas on what I could do better. Oddly, none of them were what I thought I should do to prepare her for that jump. I watched how one woman took time to treat her dog after a series of jumps and in doing so gave herself and the dog a chance to position for the next series of jumps. It made me think of two things. One is I should have been slower for Aria (which is weird because she is usually ahead of me). Then before the turn to the right I should have stopped her, given her a treat, and then given her a clear indication that I wanted her to go over the jump to her right. I think that would have helped her a lot.
But, the sad thing is I may not follow through with the best of intentions. I am not a good trainer. It is easier with JayJay because she follows me absolutely and won't do it at all if she doesn't know exactly what I want. Aria is a thinker and will offer me what she thinks is a good solution and I don't know how to get her out of doing that and instead do what I ask.
I can see us in novice forever - absolutely forever.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thanks for taking time to comment.