Finally! Some Training!

After an insane last couple of weeks of school, grading a mountain of final exams, and being sick, I finally, finally got to do some good quality training today!

I rented the building to work with Tessa on her Heelwork routine.  We only need it in . . . oh . . . two weeks!  Yikes!  I actually hoped only to do a bit of discovery mode with her today, but we ended up choreographing the entire routine!  It's simple, but that's what I wanted.  If we work diligently over these next two weeks, I think we can do a pretty nice performance.

Discovery mode was a challenge for Tessa.  I don't think she and I have ever really gone through this entire process before.  She did give some input, which surprised me.  She very clearly nixed a few of my ideas, but she also presented a few of her own.  Even though it was a bit of a stretch for her, in the end she did a great job with it.

On now to training mode, which she will absolutely love much, much more!

After working out the routine, we spent a bit of time working on duration heeling, using the clicker to build her drive as she moves in heel and side positions.  I got a bit of video of this.  The music that we were using for this exercise is not our routine music.



Finally, we broke up our training a bit by working some front and rear cross flatwork, using a cone.

Later on in the day, I had a chance to do some training at home and everyone got a short training session.

Speedy got a free form free shaping session.  I had a cone out and he got clicks and treats for touching it with his paw, touching it with his nose, going around it, backing up next to it, sitting next to it, lying down next to it, standing right up against it, etc.  He enjoyed the heck out of that.

Dean and I worked out "fly" into heel and side for Heeling Games class.  I need to get a video of that one day soon!

Tessa worked some more driving up into heel and side, with a bit of duration.  We also worked on "sit pretty" because I notice the behavior has weakened lately.  That's a great one for core strength, as well as a great Freestyle trick, so we will work on it every other day for a while.

Even Sammie got a training session.  We did some shaping with a mat.

It felt great to get back to all of this, and I look forward to our next training sessions!