Freestyle Class 2

Freestyle tonight!

So I'm going with Tainted Love. Pretty sure I'll be totally sick of the song by the time I'm done! Unfortunately my favorite music doesn't lend itself well to freestyle. Oh well.

Tom was a good boy. He pretty much has to be off-leash for freestyle. Hard to do spins and leg weaving on-leash! I alternated between on-leash, dragging leash, and off-leash. On the off-leash I tried to be very clear about "go sniff" and release him often so he got to sniff some. The training facility is still a new place with lots of interesting smells. Though, I think Tom recognized it from the car. He was less nervous/sniffy than last time but still kept his ears back for most of the class. I'd say I succeeded maybe 60% of the time in being clear about releasing him to go sniff the area and getting him back. Lost him several times, used space game to get him back and then released him properly. Some of the times I released him he followed me. Not sure if he doesn't understand the release or just decided he didn't really want to sniff anything.

I really like this! I'm going to borrow a videocamera this weekend. Hoping to get some trick videos on youtube and join the community of talented young women with dogs who do tricks, that seems to exist.

Homework: write out lyrics and start putting in choreography. Proof a lot of commands and practice them in chains.