The Current Question ....

"What have you been doing with Liryk?"

I've been asked this question quite a bit over the last few months. And to be perfectly honest. Other than trying to create drive, drive and more drive ..... not a lot :-)

You see I blame myself FULLY for Epic's hesitation in "letting loose" and going CRAZEE! And I didn't want to make the same mistakes with Liryk. I feel my biggest mistake was "controlling" Epic WAY too much.

So for Liryk I've done LOTS of shaping. I believe if she can work things out for herself, it creates confidence and with confidence comes speed. The only down side with this, with Liryk is that once she's learnt a behaviour ...... say running through a tunnel, she is of the opinion "she knows it" and actually doesn't require ANY direction / assistance from me :-) I LOVE how she's so confident in her own abilities ..... just have to let her in on the fact that we're supposed to be having a party for 2 ...... not 1 :-)

Anyhoo, other than shaping, Liryk has done lots of tunnels (yes I'm sure it's going to come and bite me on the butt come competitions, but she LOVES them!!)she's learnt the table, lots of restrained recalls and "chase me" games, the only other actual piece of agility equipment she's been on is a plank. Yes I'm going to try running contacts :-) I currently have a VERY reliable running Aframe with Epic and I really want to see if I can also teach a dogwalk. Because of my knee this might be the one chance I have, to actually be in a position to be able to handle one, that is if I can teach it!!! So at a later date I'll upload some video footage of her plank work. I currently LOVE what she is offering, but time will tell if it continues to pan out the way I hope. She's only 7mths and still has a little more growing to do, which will ultimately affect her length of stride.

I've added two video's of Liryk from last Friday's training, thanks to Tom for holding her :-) and thanks to Jenn for videoing!!!

The first one is just a restrained recall. The other is her doing a couple of tunnels. If I'm going to be critical, I really should have had the tunnels further apart, so she could build up more speed between the two. My bad!! But that's how you learn right? Either way I love how she's progressing and fingercrossed I don't stuff her up :-)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nLw9APOozY