Clean Run Magazine - January 2007 - 45

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a jump. There are exceptions—there’s no one plan of training that can
meet every dog’s needs. There are three parts to a good turn: the setup
for the turn, the turn itself across the bar, and lastly the drive back
out again. For the setup, a dog needs, whilst on the ground, to get his
weight back into his rear end— t h e powerhouse. The horse people call
it collection; in the dog it’s a far more extreme action than that. If
you look at any picture of a dog coming up for a jump and compare it to
the same dog going straight on, you’ll see the work that the dog puts in
on the ground. These pictures are of Theresa Rector’s Finn, a phenomenal
jumping dog—check out the differences in the approach and see how well
this dog uses his rear end. The photo at left shows Finn taking off for a
tunnel directly after the jump; the photo on the right shows Finn
preparing for a 90° turn that is very close, after an extended run. S e t
u p , however, is another article. In this article we’re going to focus
on what happens during and after the jump. We will not be looking at
handling or timing of cues; this work focuses on teaching skills to the
dog. There are many dogs that receive the information they require from
the handler to make a good turn, but have not yet been taught what is
expected of them in a good turn, nor do they understand how to effect a
good turn. If these dogs are going slowly, they’ll make a very nice
turn; but as soon as they get a little speed under their belts, the turns
go wide again. There are two distinct points that a dog needs to be aware
of to really understand and become proficient in turning: • First is
that having collected, the dog needs to maintain control over his rear end
whilst he’s jumping. • Next is the point at which it’s advisable to
accelerate out of a turn—hitting the ground running will make any turn
wide, no matter how well the jump was controlled over the bar. Training
the Dog to Turn Tightly Across a Jump As ever with reward-based training,
we will split this work down into tiny pieces, so that the dog is working
from a history of reward. If your only real method of communication is
withholding reward, it should make sense that there needs to be a fair
history of reward for the lack to become apparent. Next, having spent some
time looking at good turns, you now need to physically define an area
inside which you want your dog to turn. These boundaries are there for
you—very few dogs take any notice! If you’re lucky enough to have a
sand or dirt area to work in, then you can simply draw a line in the sand.
. If you’re working on grass, try using talcum powder to make a white
line in an arc around the jump. Do allow enough room to be realistic:
remember the dog has to land after the jump as well as turn, so don’t
draw such a tight circle that your dog stands no chance of being
successful. If you have a small dog, do allow enough room for the dog to
come out past the base of the jump; don’t put more barriers in your
dog’s way than necessary. Make sure that you use a winged jump for this
exercise, because once again it means that you are more likely to be
realistic about what you want your dog to achieve. January 07 | Clean Run
NOTE: I am assuming that your dog is fully aware that jumping entails
keeping the bar up. If your dog is bringing bars down then you need to do
more foundation jump work before attempting this training. Please also
make sure that your dog is old enough to jump before doing this work with
him. Even if the bars are low, this is repetitive jump work and your dog
needs to be fully grown. 45 Warning : Unknown : The session id contains invalid characters, valid
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Clean Run Magazine - January 2007

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Clean Run Magazine - January 2007