I created a new page today. It will have videos that show the running contact training process condensed into a single video. These are Trkman method videos at this point, but I will create similar pages for other methods if I find enough video to make that worthwhile. These types of videos give an overview of the process and will eventually highlight a variety of different dogs. There isn’t as much detail in these shorter videos but they are still a good way to help you train your eye to see the dog’s feet at speed.
There are three videos to start and more to come later. The new Trkman Video Compilations page can be found under Featured Pages in the sidebar, or the menu in the header at the top of the blog.
Here is one of the videos to get you started.
From Great Britain, FCI World Team Member and European Open Competitor Hannah Mitchell and Her Poodle Chica.
Tags: Silvia Trkman, Training, Trkman Method, Video
Bonnie Norris owns and operates the Paws for Applause Dog Agility School near Dallas Texas. Her newest dog is her Border Collie Ice. Ice was trained with a stopped Dogwalk performance, and with Rachel Sanders’ box method for a running A-frame. (Bonnie later transitioned to a running dogwalk as well, as described later in this post)
Bonnie took a lot of video at various stages of the A-frame training. I didn’t find video of the very beginning with the box on the ground but there is a good series with the box on the A-frame. You can find Bonnie’s videos on her YouTube Channel. Here is a playlist of the A-frame training.
Running A-frame Sanders Method
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=B1820A261A84B29E
Bonnie describes Ice as a very soft dog, and felt he was much happier and more confident with his running A-frame training than his stopped Dogwalk training. After a few months in competition, Bonnie realized how much more confidence and speed Ice had when performing his A-frame as opposed to his stopped Dogwalk. At that point she decided to take the leap and try and get the same enthusiasm for the Dogwalk that Ice had for the A-frame by converting his stopped Dogwalk to a running Dogwalk. She used Silvia Trkman’s method. This is well documented on Bonnie’s YouTube Channel also. I have included a playlist below.
Running Dogwalk Trkman Method
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=CF741AB5318DEA6F
Here are two recently added videos of Bonnie and Ice working on turns after the dogwalk.
Turns After Running Dogwalk
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=C0EE2F41A5A232B2
I’m sure there will be more videos added in the future so keep an eye on Bonnie’s YouTube Channel and I’ll do periodic updates here too.
There’s a good post on Daisy Peel’s blog yesterday. She was talking about the timing of cues for turns after the dogwalk with her dog Solar. Solar has running-contacts and has been trialing for about 8 months. Daisy talks about how Solar seems to have a point on the dogwalk where he commits to the striding that will allow him to hit the yellow and execute the turn that’s being cued following the dogwalk.
A quote from her post:
“Just as Solar doesn’t always commit to each jump at the same distance from the jump, he doesn’t commit to the end of the board at the same distance from the end of the board, although as a general rule, commitment seems to have happened, for the most part, by the time his nose is halfway across the entire length of the 36′ dogwalk.
Being able to give effective cues while Solar is on the dogwalk depends on my ability to figure out when he has reached that point just before commitment. “
Failure to cue Solar in time makes it hard for him to hit the yellow while meeting criteria, and still make the indicated turn.
Daisy wrote a lot of great posts on the process of training Solar’s running-contacts. I’ve linked to them on this page Daisy Peel and Solar which you can also reach from the Resource Pages in the side bar or the Resources tab in the header. It’s a must read if you are thinking about training running-contacts.
Tags: Daisy Peel, Dogwalk, Training, Trialing, Trkman Method
I came across Olga’s site a few days ago. Olga lives in Poland and she is training running-contacts with her Dutch Shepherd Eri. Olga is using a method that she says is influenced by Silvia Trkman’s method and also Ali Canova’s method. There is a foot target for the Dogwalk but not the A-Frame. So a different method for the A-Frame vs the Dogwalk.
All of Olga’s videos are on her YouTube Channel. Here are a couple showing her running A-Frame training.
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=4547A1AD1280637E
Olga has a blog also where she talks about her training and has some video and pictures of the process. Her blog is in two versions, an English version as well as a Polish version. The English language posts on A-Frames are here.
Olga has a few videos of her Dogwalk training but none of the target on the ground but she does talk about that in her blog. Doing a search on the blog for Dogwalk brings them up.
Here are some video clips of Olga’s running Dogwalk training with Eri.
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=AA62EA7CB0FA128E
Olga is still working through the process with Eri. The last video was a couple of weeks ago (mid-May 2009) so I’m sure that there will be more. To follow Eri’s progress check Olga’s blog. I’ll try to keep up to date also.
Tags: A-Frame, Canova Method, Dogwalk, Training, Trkman Method
Kathy Mazzola has posted lots of nice footage of her running-contact training with her Border Collie Gorgeous. On her YouTube channel there are 16 videos showing many stages of training. The videos begin at the very early plank stage and go right to full contacts. Kathy has worked sequences into her plank work, which I thought was interesting. It’s well worth watching the whole playlist as there is a lot to learn from all that video if you want to train using the Trkman method. I’ve broken it into three parts, two of the training process and one of competition.
Early Training Stages
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=7C05D9DBE7083799
Later Training Stages
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=4207B08287BDB7F1
Competition Footage
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=006F0728BD94C66D
This is apparently the end of her video diary on the running contacts. It seems like she did a nice job.
Tags: Competition, Dogwalk, Running Contacts, Training, Trialing, Trkman Method, Video
Zsuzsa Veres has competed with the Hungarian Agility Team at the FCI Dog Agility World Championships as well as the European Open. Her YouTube Channel has a lot of competition videos as well as a selection of training videos. She has videos of her running contact training with two of her dogs, Kaj and the younger Eta. Both are Croatian Sheep dogs.
Zsuzsa has a web page with a lot of information about her dogs, her training, and her competitions. She trains her running-contacts using Silvia Trkman’s method.
There is more information and videos than I can put in a single post so be sure to see this page for her links that I will keep updated. You can find that page and others like in the resources section by using the tabs at the top or the categories menu in the sidebar.
Here is a sample video of her and Noun training, from her YouTube channel .
Noun (Pyrenean Sheperd)- Full Dogwalk Sequences
Tags: Dogwalk, Training, Trkman Method, Video, ZsuZsa Veres
Emily has some video of her training sessions with her Border Collie Josie. She is training a running Aframe and is using Rachel Sander’s box method. I didn’t see any video of the early sessions on the ground but there are a number of videos of the later stages. They are all on Emilie’s YouTube Channel. She has a playlist of training videos. Emily has a web page with posts about her dogs but I didn’t notice any on teaching running-contacts
To simplify things I have made a playlist of the Running A-Frame videos.
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=AA270A9A460001C8
Tags: A-Frame, Box, Rachel Sanders, Sanders Method, Training
Nina and her border Collie Jay live in Germany. They are training running-contacts using Silvia Trkman’s method. She has a blog/website that has a lot of agility posts on it. It is written in German so I am unable to tell you much more about it.
Nina’s YouTube Channel has a lot of European agility footage. There is also a range of training videos. There are nine videos of Jays’ running-contact training. They start right at the beginning stage with a board on the ground. The most recent was a couple of weeks ago (April 29, 2009) with the plank at almost a full dogwalk height and angle. I will keep tabs on Nina’s channel and link to new videos when another batch becomes available.
For now, here is a playlist of the first 9 videos.
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=A8603AD805258242
Tags: Blog, Running Contacts, Silvia Trkman, Training, Trkman Method, Video
Wendy Pendleton has some video of her training process with her awesome Golden Retriever, Cheetah. Wendy is training a running A-Frame using Rachel Sanders box method. The videos are on her YouTube Channel. I’ve created a playlist of them for easy viewing but I’m sure more will be added to her Channel as time goes on.
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=B30B43D24075F94F
Wendy also has a Blog called Team Cheetah wher she discusses some of the training process. Searching the blog for posts containing ‘Rachel’ brings up some of the relevant posts. Others come up if you search for “Running A-Frame”. That search also brings up some posts about their experiences at the 2008 AKC World Team Tryouts.
Tags: A-Frame, Agility, Blog, Rachel Sanders, Running Contacts
Today I noticed an article by Tracy Sklenar in Dog Sport Magazine. At the moment the article can be read on-line as a sample article. Tracy talks about some of the things to consider when choosing between stopped contacts and running-contacts.
There are some thoughts on the differences in training and maintainance of both types of contacts. Tracy also touches on the advantages and disadvantages of running-contacts on course. She compares two examples of course designs that would be easier to handle depending on whether you had stopped or running contacts. Similar to the example below.
Overall she prefers stopped contacts for most competitors, citing many of the same reasons that Susan Garrett did on her blog recently.
The full article can be found at the Dog Sport magazine web site. Read it here.
Tags: Competition, Running Contacts, Training