Wall-e's first and second rally classes

Two weeks ago, I started taking a beginner rally class with Wall-e. I've taken rally before with Mika in 2007. I've always wanted to do more obedience of some kind with Wall-e, as he just loves to heel and is pretty good at it too!

First class: October 30

Wall-e loved seeing the other dogs at the beginning of class. In the class, there are two lab/poodles (I think one *might* be a golden/poodle, can't remember), a hound mix, a shepherd mix, and a German Shepherd Dog.

The class covers both CARO (Canadian Association of Rally Obedience) and CKC (Canadian Kennel Club) Novice rally exercises. Most of the exercises are the same, but some have different names; for those, I'll just use the CARO names because if we ever do compete, we'd concentrate mostly on CARO. I'll In the first class, we covered:

Halt - Sit (CKC only)
Halt - Sit - Down
Halt - Sit - Stand
Halt - Down - Sit
Halt - Walk Around
Halt - Sit - Walk Around
Halt - Down - Walk Around
Weave Once
Fast Pace
Slow Pace
Normal Pace

(Sorry if I messed up any of the names; I'm working from memory.)

Wall-e really enjoyed it. I realized how much I have to work on his downs; at this class, he wasn't dropping fully down and usually had his elbows off the floor.

When we first approached the cones in the Weave Once exercise, Wall-e tried to interact with one of the cones (pawing it), haha. We've done a lot of shaping exercises with cones and he probably thought that's what we were doing! He soon understood what to do, though.

At the end of each class, we'll be doing a sequence of exercises that will eventually build up to a full course. This week, we did Start (basically just the start line, not really an exercise), Weave Once, Halt - Down, and then Finish (the "finish line"). The Weave Once went well, but I do have to work on Wall-e's downs! He enjoyed it, though.

Second class: November 6

Exercises covered:

Straight Figure 8
Moving Down - Forward (CKC only)
Right Turn
About Turn - Right
270 Degree Right Turn
360 Degree Right Turn

(Only right turns were covered this week because left turns are a bit tougher.)

After working on downs at home, Wall-e's downs were much better this week!

The sequence for this class was Start, Weave Once, Halt - Sit - Down, Right Turn, Halt - Sit - Walk Around, Right Turn, Fast Pace, Normal Pace (just a transition from Fast Pace), and Finish. The first few stations went well, but we had a bit of trouble with the Halt - Sit - Walk Around; Wall-e hasn't learned this yet, so I tried to let him chew on a treat as I walked around him, but he would stand up when I started to step behind him. After two tries, I rewarded him for staying when I took a tiny step, and then moved on to the next stations, which Wall-e did great at.

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We would have another class today too, but it was canceled because the instructor is attending a local rally trial. Next week, we'll learn the left turns.