The world's most ridiculous agility dog...being slightly less ridiculous!

 Wow you did a really NICE handling job on the serpentine in the first 20 second bit.  Excellent!

 As the handler improves, the dog improves.  Hooray Dahlia, looking good BOTH of you!

 Thank you!  We're both steadily improving!  I feel a lot less like I'm flailing around than I did before.  I'm not using some of those huge arm gestures you see in parts of these videos either (we worked on removing those!) so my front crosses work much better.

Dahlia you are doing so great...so is your human   Of course me and the boys think you are the prettiest BBG around!

Wow looking great. You are really moving right along and getting some real excitement into Dahlia doing better. Awesome. Who was the seminar done by and where? Looked like it might have been Tracey.

You both look like you're having fun!  I get a little winded when I watch agility videos -- so much movement!  I'm sure you've both done a ton of work to get so far -- I hope you have continued success in trials!

nymaureen

Wow looking great. You are really moving right along and getting some real excitement into Dahlia doing better. Awesome. Who was the seminar done by and where? Looked like it might have been Tracey.

Dahlia is definitely moving right along and I'm thrilled with her!   She's actually looking like she's a real agility dog.  We have a trial this Sunday so I'm hoping we can pull out SOME of this at the trial.  I still have a hard time there.  She won't tug at trials and she's definitely a little more stressed there.  And unlike a lot of agility dogs she doesn't get zoomies, she just sort of shuts down and loses interest.  She's at least better about working WITH me and hasn't refused to move at a trial since May, so there's that!

And it was with Tracy, though I was trying not to mention her name!  I purposely used just a couple clips and cut out all spoken stuff because I know she doesn't like her instructions to be put up on the internet.

tacran

You both look like you're having fun!  I get a little winded when I watch agility videos -- so much movement!  I'm sure you've both done a ton of work to get so far -- I hope you have continued success in trials!

 

It is a LOT of movement!  And I have asthma so it leaves me VERY winded. If I forget my inhaler I can be in a lot of trouble.

We've been working at this for about 2 1/2 years!  I know many people would be FAR ahead of us (and some are; one person who started with us is close to being in Excellent level in AKC and we haven't Q'ed in AKC Novice even once!) but I started as a totally green handler with a totally green dog who was about the most mellow dog you could imagine.  It's been hard work to get her even as excited as you see in the video!  And I have to learn to trust her to just DO it and all.  So there's been a lot of work that's gone into it to get us that far.

 

Don't even try to compare how most others who started with you are so far ahead, especially if they are on their second or maybe even third or fourth dog. I often say how difficult it must be for those totally new to the sport because a good percentage of beginner dogs are not with beginner people. You see these dogs advancing so much faster and I'm sure it gets some discouraged. And, not only are the dogs with seasoned trainers, many are dogs the people have bred with agility in mind. You go girl taking your mellow rescue dog and doing what you have thus far. You are both looking great. My first two dogs were around 7 or 8 when I started with them and it took a lot to get them moving along. It is much less tiring working with a wild boy like Corey (well, once we got things together anyway) than it was trying to get my first two motivated and keeping them that way. And I have asthma as well. Glad to see the both of you having such a fun time.

Forgot to ask. Where is the trial this weekend? Is it another CPE or is it AKC. You'll have to come out and see us at one of the USDAA trials at Over Rover. If you feel like it some time this summer you could come up and do a practice in our yard. We have all the equipment except the dog walk.

 We'd love to come out and practice!

The trial this weekend is CPE and it's out at Boomtowne.  I'm definitely more serious about doing CPE.  I enjoy it and I know it and so we're sticking with that for now.  We may eventually try AKC again but right now I'm focusing on CPE until I feel more comfortable.

 If Over Rover does more show 'n' goes we'll definitely be there for some of them.  I was so thankful they did that this summer.

 It's definitely harder being a rank beginner with your first dog when nearly everyone else who started with us was on their 2nd or more dogs. Which wasn't something I totally realized.  Some of the folks who started with us are competing at much higher levels, but we're learning our way along!  For rank beginners (this is my first dog ever!) I think we're doing pretty well.  No, we'll never be big champions or get a MACH and probably not even a C-ATCH (ok PACH or CT-ATCH for us) but it's fun and we enjoy it!  And we'll go as far as we can.

 We'd love for you to come out some time. Not sure if you saw the couple of videos I had uploaded before.  Anyhow, here's another I just uploaded....link to me working Gus in the backyard. Not sure how this video is...whether it is shaky or not, but at least you can see what the backyard is like. I just can't seem to figure this video world out.

http://youtu.be/zadvSJx6mXU

The video looks great!  And I'm super jealous of your backyard.  I don't even have a yard! lol  My dream is to someday have a nice big flat back yard that I can fence in and put equipment in.