Clean Run - April 2014 - 39

Getting Inside Your

dog's head
Secrets to Perfect Timing

By Kathy Keats, The Agility Coach

You started to understand your dog better in the first lessons
when you learned to really watch your dog, and then you began practicing reacting to what you were seeing. Last month,
you learned your reactions while handling could be automatic
if you are certain of what your cues are and you don't overwhelm yourself with too many cues.
The next step is to get inside your
dog's head and understand what he
really knows, what he will do in
certain situations, and what his tendencies are. This allows you to stay
ahead of him. Watching him and really seeing him allows you to react
to what is happening or about to happen, but knowing him allows you to
plan and anticipate even earlier in a
sequence. It's important to note that
anticipating and assuming are two
different things. When I anticipate
something, I am still "present" with
what is happening on course and I
can change my plan if necessary. But
when I assume, I look too far ahead
and I don't see what is happening in
front of me.
I once heard a top handler in another dog sport say, "It's not so
much that the dogs mature at five and six years old, it's more
that's when the handler figures the dog out." Top handlers
often run young dogs very well because they understand the
dog's tendencies and training and support the dog where he
needs it. But many people kid themselves about their dog's
level of training and what their dog understands, and then
blame the dog for tendencies which are really handler flaws. I
have often heard handlers say their dogs are "tunnel suckers,"
yet when I watch the handler, the handler is so late cueing the
dog I would have gone in the tunnel myself!
Do you know whether your dog is more likely to pull off and
refuse an angled jump? What angles do you need to support
more? Which obstacle is your dog more likely to lock onto
April 14

| Clean Run

or refuse? What movements of yours have the most effect on
your dog's commitment, extension, and collection?
Another mistake people often make is to assume their training is better than it is. If instructors had a dime for every time
a dog has made a mistake or refused
to perform a behavior and the student
said, "But my dog knows [insert command]," we'd all be able to retire.
"Knowing" the behavior means that
the dog can perform the behavior under
any distraction and in any situation.
Would you bet me $100 that your dog
will successfully perform that behavior
no matter what scenario I set up? Before you read any further, please take
a moment and answer the 10 questions
on the next page.
Any question that received less than a
score of 7 needs training attention from
you. Write down some details as to what
came to mind when you read that statement. Have you not spent enough time
training the behavior or the cue (which
are two different things), or maybe the
statement was only relevant to certain
obstacles or situations. Write down those details so you can
focus more specifically on them. Why haven't you dealt with
them yet? Perhaps it's not something you like to train, or maybe
you don't know the next training step. But to move your game
and your timing to the next level, it must be addressed.
Why is all this so important? So that you can anticipate where
your dog will need more support on course, where you can
give him full responsibility for performance, and what obstacle or skill needs to be trained better. Knowing your dog
allows you to be more proactive than reactive, and being proactive means that you can give timely cues.
Understanding your dog also has a tremendous impact on the
next aspect of handling, which is knowing what you can get
to-the focus of my next article. D
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Clean Run - April 2014

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Clean Run - April 2014