When should you retrain a stopped contact to a running contact? Trainer Bonnie Norris made a choice that seems to be paying off for her. Back on June 7th (2009) I did a post on Bonnie and her Border Collie Ice. Bonnie had trained a running A-frame using Rachel Sander’s box method, and a stopped contact for the dogwalk.
Bonnie was unhappy with Ice’s performance of the dogwalk. She saw that Ice was very confident when performing his running A-frame, but much less confident when performing his stopped Dogwalk. She wondered whether she could get the same confidence on the dogwalk by changing to a running contact for it also. She eventually decided to retrain Ice’s dogwalk to a running contact using Silvia Trkman’s method.
Here’s a video of Ice’s first 5 months of competition. The first half is with stopped contacts. You can clearly see that he is very hesitant on the dogwalk compared to the A-frame. In the last half of the video he is doing the retrained running contact and he is much faster.
Stopped Dogwalk vs. Running Dogwalk
Truthfully, I’m the sort of person who believes that almost any “normal, healthy dog” can be trained to perform stopped contacts reliably, and with good speed. However, watching that video really makes me wonder whether it’s always a good idea to persevere in the face of adversity. If you are swimming upstream, is it always a good idea to just swim harder?
Could Ice eventually have learned to perform a stopped dogwalk, happily, confidently and at speed? Even if he could, is it necessarily the best choice? Perhaps sometimes it’s better to consider the individual dog, and “brush with the fur” instead of against it. I can’t say that I know the answer, but Ice sure seems happier with his new dogwalk performance.
In an recent email to me Bonnie said:
…I expect that we are only just beginning our adventure with running contacts. As he increases his confidence level, I’m sure our challenges will evolve in a new direction as well.But that’s what keeps us getting out of bed in the morning, right?
Indeed. Maybe one day running contacts will be the norm in agility. But at the moment it seems that most people who are training them are filled with a sense of adventure about the process. That’s got to be exciting, or scary, or both. You can keep up to date on Bonnie and Ice’s progress on Bonnie’s YouTube Channel. Also, take a look at the original post for more video and links about Ice’s running dogwalk training.
Tags: A-Frame, Dogwalk, Rachel Sanders, Running Contacts, Sanders Method, Trkman Method
Don’t you think the lack of confidence of the dog in the dogwalk was due to the lack of confidence of the handler?
In the video is clear that the handler slow down the speed at the end of dogwalk.
Maybe if the dog could perform an independent contact with the handler at distance
the confidence of both would increase.
The running dogwalk is good for both too.
Congratulations!
I’ve never seen the team in person. I don’t think it’s possible to see the root cause of the issue in those clips. I agree that some handlers cause dogs to lose confidence. But I think she would have tried a few changes to her handling before embarking on training a whole new contact performance
Yes, I could have worked harder to build more speed and drive to the end and push his level of independence for the 2o2o behavior, but almost immediately after our first trial, I had decided to switch to a running DW.
Also, this dog was not only very young but a dog who’s temperament did not respond well to lots of pressure. To “push” the issue of motion dependent vs. motion independent DW at that age, for this particular dog, was just not an option that I felt was in my dogs best interest at the time.
To add to that, as a handler, I WAS lacking in some confidence, because I was training the running DW at the same time I was trialing with a 2o2o DW. The ONLY time I ever asked for a 2o2o DW was at the trial. I never trained it outside of the trial setting once I began competing, because at that point, I had decided to switch. Since I had no prior experience with this, nor did I know of anyone that has ever done this, I really wasn’t sure how it was going to all pan out and how he was going to respond at each trial.
As it turns out, he transitioned quite nicely, never missing a contact. This last weekend at USDAA Regionals, he made it to Finals in Steeplechase, finishing 9th as a 22 month old dog. So I think his running contacts were the key ingredient needed, with this dogs’ particular set of characteristics, to build his confidence and speed overall.
As far as my level of confidence now, when you are competing with running contacts, it’s always a mental challege to “let go” and accept that fact that you have little control over the dogs performance and “going for it” is the only option. :~)
I am glad you clarified those points. I hadn’t realized that many of those clips of the 2o2o dogwalk contacts were taken during the running dogwalk training. I had no idea that was even possible.
Right! Nor did I! :~)
Were you training the running DW at the same time I were trialing with a 2o2o DW?
You really did (and are doing) a great job!
Congratulations again!
I mean: Were you training the running DW at the same time YOU were trialing with a 2o2o DW?
Sorry everyone for my bad english. #^_^#
Yes I was. I had the opiton, of course to stop trialing him, once I started his running DW training. Many of my fellow trainers suggested that I stop trialing to retrain the running DW, but none of them had experience specifically with what I was doing.
Since Ice was doing his 2o2o DW quite nicely in competition, I decided to keep competing as I didn’t really care if he did the 2o2o with confidence or speed, since I would shortly be switching to a running DW.
My main concern was quite the opposite: how would his competition 2o2o negatively affect his running DW training? My guess is that because the ONLY time I ever asked for the 2o2o DW was in competition, it wasn’t enough repetitions to aversely impact his running DW training.
I had about a 2 or 3 week down time between trials, so at that point I switched to the running DW and after that, never asked for a 2o2o DW again.
I do have a friend that is training both the running DW and 2o2o DW simultaneously and I’ve heard that Susan Garrett has BOTH, though I don’t know that fore sure.
For my dog, I felt training both and maintaining both was just too much time and effort and confusion, so I opted to completely drop the 2o2o.
Bonnie Norris
How long did it take you to train the running dogwalk and begin using it at trials?
Rose