Obedience Run Throughs

I have been trying to motivate myself lately to attend some obedience run throughs/open ring time with Zumi.  She needs the practice in not only training with a slightly more formal atmosphere, but feeling some of the stress in the air that usually accompanies such events.

One of the club holds the run throughs every Friday, I just haven't been motivated to drive the 40 minutes in rush hour so sadly Zumi has never been.  Until last week that is!  Yay for me!
I did 2 runs, one in the open ring and one in the utility ring.  And then yesterday I had the opportunity to do another run through at a closer location!  It was much quieter though, so while it was still great practice it didn't have that stressful atmosphere.

Run Through Set #1
Last week's run through started out with more ring confidence and play work before diving into some little bit of training.  Since Zumi was focused and happy I decided to move on to see how her dumbbell work would be in the environment.  I tried to be good and just do 5 foot throws.  And I'm very happy to report no vocalizing!!!  And giving me great eye contact too!  On the downside, she was really vulturing again and moving her front feet forward.


In the utility ring I decided to do more of a modified run through.  This turned out to be a mistake for her.  It wasn't bad by any means, but even with the modifications, she made more mistakes than I would like in that environment.

Good:
Signals were good! But I reset a turn.  Not sure if it was the pressure of a judge following or if it was due to my footwork as I told the judge I wanted just a short down and back heeling pattern and she added in a turn. 
Articles were great!  I used 5 of her lids and she nailed the nose touch alert even with the judge standing there!

Meh:
Gloves she didn't quite see it and ended up veering off of #3 to go to the side gate.  On the redo she nailed it.  I already know I haven't really practiced gloves with Zumi in pretty much forever.

Go out I started half way and she veered off to the stanchion to the right.  On the redos she did well. But needed extra help to get the jumps on the return.  An issue that was surprisingly common for her in training when I was actually training it...  I thought I had fixed it but it's also been a long time since I've done any directed jumping work.

Run through Set #2
Yesterday's event was pure open ring, no judge.  And it was pretty quiet.  I started my time in the Open ring with more of what I did at the other location.   But this time I had her toy left behind on the table.

I did 2 drop on recalls with her and on the first attempt I used just a hand signal.  Zumi slowed but didn't start to drop so I happily interrupted it.  As we raced playfully back to the other side Zumi got a little too wound up with barking and I had her do some sticky targets to calm her down.  I was pretty proud of her for how well she was able to the duration nose touch and relax herself.

The retrieve work was about the same as last week's run through.  No squealing, but moving her front feet.  I chose to walk out and set the dumbbell on the ground for her 3 short attempts.

In the utility ring I did more training again.  I noticed issues with Zumi heeling into a gate and quickly reset two times.  Something I haven't noticed at all with her in practice but will be trying to work on again with her.

Signals Zumi had issues with taking steps after I left her.  Another issue I  haven't noticed at all in practice!

Articles I decided to test her with her rings instead of the flat plates.  She scented and then just grabbed on the first rep, but then did 2 nice ones for me.  Didn't look too frantic at least but she did fumble the return on the last one!

Go outs were interesting.  No squealing, yay!!!  But she was doing a wide arch to her left.  If anything Zumi's issue has always been wanting to do a slight diagonal to the right, not an arc and certainly not the the left!
And then she was wanting to do a fake touch and immediately come back for the reward vs waiting out there for me to deliver the reward.  At one point she even offered a handstand to the gate.  What are you thinking Zumi?!!  Of course I'm not really surprised with the lack of confidence on this exercise considering it's one of the 3 big areas we've been working on (articles, go outs, retrieves!) with her arousal issues.

Funniest go out at 4:35!


My goal this year is to get myself out and about more with Zumi's obedience.  I just haven't been that committed to get her obedience skills really trained and certainly not in different locations.  I would like to make it to the Friday night run throughs once a month with her.