6.7. - La keeps recovering at the only speed she knows: FAST - see&read more...
- new answers to FAQ: my running contacts
- a quickly made tricks show with Bu that I needed to do on a short notice, so it's not a very fancy one, will do another one when I have time
- some pictures from Corsica. We shortened our stay there because La started to vomit, but we did quite some hiking before that. It's funny because while their beaches are like in Sardinia, their mountains are like Norway: the green was just as green, our shoes were just as wet and we were just as cold as in Norway. But it sure is gorgeous!!! Great choice for all hiking fans!
And in case you'll be mailing me in weeks to come and wonder why I'm not answering my mail: we're leaving abroad for some seminars next week, so I won't be checking my mail for some time.
2.7. - I'm happy to announce
that La won again. This is her most important win, the only one that really
counts. Vets didn't think she has many chances, but then, they don't know what a
special dog La is, how much power, strength, determination and lust for life she
has in that little body of hers. Another thing they don't know is that dogs that
really love their life and have something important to fight for, will fight and
will live. That belief was also what kept me optimistic throughout the whole
process. My only thought when she was being operated on was: if she can climb
any mountain, if she can fly over any height, she can win this one too.
Special thanks to Metka Simundic, dr.vet.med., and to all the staff at Prva K
for taking such a good care of us, to Butinar, dr.vet.med, who operated on
her, to Tanja and her Shaja who gave blood to save La and of course to all
who helped with suggestions on her postoperative care and on how to gain back
some weight or were keeping their fingers crossed for her. And to La for being a
miracle dog again.
All this again reminded me of how lucky I am to have her, how special she is and
how much she means to me. As many people that were mailing me in those difficult
days stated: there are many great dogs out there. But there will never be
another one like La.
To read the whole long story, go here.
30.5. - Wow, updating twice in the same day, that's my personal record! But I really wanted to share this video with you, to answer all those who think long-strided dogs can't do running contacts... I think Klepto sure proves that wrong! Nice dog-walk huh!?! It still makes me smile, even after all the running dog-walks I've seen... Good job Jef!
30.5. - Bragging with my
puppy students this time:). We did this video as a presentation of my puppy
class for our club, but as I get many questions on what I work on with puppies, I guess
you might want to see this video to get an idea. Puppies in the video are from 3 months to not-puppies-anymore
and are showing what we do in a first half of a course - as you can see, we
focus on attention and body awareness, meaning: we do lots of tricks!:) Good job puppies!
I also added some new links to videos of dogs, being trained by my running
contacts method to
FAQ: My
running contacts and uploaded some
recent agility photos, taken by Andraz Cerar and Iztok Noc. Thanks guys!
19.4. - new FAQ on puppy and tricks training
- some pictures from a demo with La and Bu on a seminar in Limoges, France (merci Valerie!)
13.4. - In case you were wondering where we were last two months... We were mostly aboard, holding seminars, first in USA, then in France and Germany. Now we're finally back home, our competition season is slowly starting, we just had a competition yesterday. In both runs, La had best overall time and Bu had best time in both runs in large class - and one bar down, but not bad at all for my slow, no drive BC! I don't have any videos from this competition yet, but I'm putting up jumping runs from all, Lo, La and Bu from previous competition (with big, big THANKS to Petra who is so kindly filming all our runs!!!) - in that run, again, La had best time from all categories (no surprises here...) and Bu had best time in large class. I'm also adding some recent photos from our walks.
12.2. - As the most enthusiastic of my tricks freaks friends already taught their dogs all the two-legged tricks, I'm adding a new tricks video with some of the tricks we have been working on lately, in case you need some new ideas for the rest of the winter... Enjoy!
I'm also adding some pictures from recent trips to the mountains - yeah, we didn't get any snow in Ljubljana this winter, so we needed to climb some mountains to enjoy some snow. And as you can see bellow, La decided she wants to do some snow boarding and thought on her own to ride on my back on a way down from the mountain:
Oh, and if you mail me after today and wonder why I'm not answering: I will be abroad for almost a month now, so be patient, I'll try to answer all when I get back.
9.2. - five new FAQ in my Running contacts article
- new FAR (Frequent Accusations Rejected): FAR from truth, an answer to rumours
- coming soon: new tricks video!
And, oh, we have another birthday girl today... Happy 2nd birthday Bu!!!
So young and already so smart!:)
31.1. - I'm adding an updated version of running contacts video, featuring 19 different dogs (10 large, 8 medium and 1 small), trained by my running contacts method. If your dog is also trained by my method, but not yet included in this video, please send the video and I'll use it for the next edition.
I also uploaded some photos from a photo session we had for a dog magazine that is publishing an interview with me and needed some photos. Well, here they are... Of course, my favourite one is this perfect heeling of La (yeah, I know, what a great little doggy...):
25.1. - Sorry, not much new over here... Just a video from agility training at our very, very muddy agility field, including some more running contacts and also Bu's new fastest dog-walk I have on video, taking her 1.33s from the time first paws meet a dog-walk to the moment last feet leave it. And for those that think long strided dogs can't do running contacts, there is also a slow-motion video of Bu's 4-strides dog-walk. She sometimes does 4, sometimes 5 strides, depending on an approach and La normally does it in 5 strides.
Oh, and a little brag on Lo: she started her 12th year of age by winning a competition last weekend. She had third best time in jumping (partly thanks to La and Bu that had an off course...) from all jump height categories and won overall competition in A3 medium. Oh, and for those that think agility is harmful for dogs: Lo was on her first agility training when she was exactly 7 weeks old and is training regularly ever since as every break, longer from 2 weeks, causes epileptic seizures. 11 years later, she is still winning in highest category, on her normal jump height.
10.1. - Happy 11th birthday, my good old Lo! To another 11 happy, crazy, barky years!
Lo, 4 months, 1997 Lo, 11 years, 2008
As my good old Lo is pretty much living in the shadow of La for last 6 years (and she prefers it that way, she is not show-off kind of a dog like La is:), let me thank Lo at this occasion for everything she has taught me in those 11 years. I've got my first lesson on patience on our first stop on a petrol station on the way home from Belgium, where I put her down on a grass and while she was following me nicely and tightly behind my heels, as tight that you couldn't see her looking over your shoulder -you needed to turn all the way around- she was so afraid of hands that I couldn't pick her up to take her back to a car. I needed to sit on the floor for half of an hour for her to climb in my lap, so that I could put my arms around her before she saw hands and panicked... She sure taught me to let dogs do things at their own rate, to never ask them something they can't give you and wait until they're ready. For her, it meant 6 months before she dared to go over dog-walk, some more before I could put a leash on her for the first time as she was getting panic attacks before if I tried to do it etc. Still, at 21 month, she was running her first World Championship and ran eight more after that! Before the ere of La, she was the most successful agility dog around, with many, many wins and unbeatable times on grass. And even though she goes by unnoticed by most, nowadays that La is taking all the glory, Lo is still a really great dog with a really big heart, always putting everything into everything she does and always ready to do whatever you wish. She is our clown, always in a good mood, always full of energy, even at her age. She is still competing at her regular height and it's still impossible to tire her out. So... To another 11 years, my good old Lo!
30.12. - To all our visitors: a very, very
27.12. - We're not having many trials in the winter - but we sure do lots of hiking, we're having a really nice, sunny weather this winter. Here are some photos from our walks.
I also added a new answer to My running contacts and one to FAQ on training see-saw, weave-poles, speed and more and wrote a new FAQ article on training&trialing - copy-paste from my mail correspondence with visitors of the site.
As you can see, Bu decided for new hair dye. - Just to explain why my car looks the way it does...
3.12. I added a new article, FearShep?, as an answer to questions on how problematic or not fearfulness is in PyrSheps. And, some latest photos from agility competitions, taken by Andraz Cerar, Iztok Noc and Uros Modlic. Big thanks to our photographers!
18.11. - For all the tricks freaks who are mailing me for some new tricks suggestions, I'm adding a funny video with Two Legged Tricks - first three are easy, but last three should keep you busy for the winter:).
15.11. - I finally added a photo album from our vacations in France and a new article, FAQ on training see-saw, weave-poles, speed and more
14.10. - a video of Bu's first run and first win in the highest, A3 class
13.10. - Bu had her first start in A3 class today - and won agility with 2.5s of advantage!!! Yeah, maybe my slow, no-drive BC is not all that slow afterall... I'll add a video as soon as I get it.
On a request of my friends from France who are writing a book on agility and wanted to include photos of "jump" version of a jump and "cik" version of a jump, Andraz nicely agreed to do some photos of Bu and I'm adding them to Our famous cik&cap article to show the difference between the two:
- extension jumping
- five stages of
cik that means to a dog that
1. no matter from which direction you come
2. you should only take off very close to the wing
3. wrap around the wing as close as possible
4. with hind feet under you
5. and land as close to the wing as possible, already facing the right direction
-
as you can see, this change of direction was 180 degrees, so not an easy one.
Big THANKS to Andraz Cerar for the photos!
10.10. - Hill's invited La to a dog show to Roma, Italy, for a trick show. And, since there was also agility on Sunday, we of course also ran a competition. Lo thought the carpet could be better, La thought it's great that many people came to watch her:) and Bu thought it's horrible that some of the dogs are so big and scary and loud and that all dogs bigger from BC size should be banned by dangerous dog act, so I was afraid she won't feel too comfortable running in that loud hall, but she surprised me with two nice runs. I'm putting up agility run since this is her last win in A2, won with 5.3m/s of average speed, not bad for a carpet. She is in the highest, A3 class now.
How about throwing this stick intead of taking photos?
4.10. - As promised, I'm publishing all my videos from Hamar. Big thanks to Vesna for taping it!
individual jumping - 1st place and by far (1.5s) best time despite some not so perfect turns
team agility - I liked this run a lot, despite almost crashing into the additional judge
team jumping - 1st place, my best run and great time despite it was not my type of a course, too many straight lines for little La and no turns to gain advantage
individual agility - nice run, but unfortunately no A-frame contact...
If anybody is interested: for $19, you can see all the runs from all other participants here
3.10. - After 34 hours on a bus, we're back home from Agility World Championships in Hamar, Norway. How was Hamar? Lots of fun in and outside the ring, but lots of bad luck results-wise. Disappointed? Not at all, best time in all four courses, nice lines with an exception of one bigger turn, winning two of four courses – that’s most certainly good enough for me.
Those two runs that we won mean that La by now won 9 runs on World Championships!!! This world record sure means a lot to me, actually even more than any World Champion title. Yeah, you can get to a World Champion title thanks to bad luck of others, but you can only win a run with an extremely good dog and an extremely good run.
For more, see WC Hamar 2007 report. Videos of all four runs coming soon!
La on a contact that was judged as missed. (Photo is taken from official WC website.)
24.9. - Please note: my old e-mail address will stop working in a couple of days, so in case you need to contact me, please use my new e-mail address: silvia.trkman at gmail.com
Also, three new questions&answers in my
FAQ: My
running contacts article and for all those that asked
for some video material on how some of the stages of training look like, here
are some links to
PyrShep Luka,
PyrShep Vigo, PyrShep Noun,
BC Bilbo,
BC Smitten,
BC
Gorgeous,
mix
Jimmy,
Mudi Pletyka,
Croatian Sheepdog Kaj, all trained by my method.
And, better later than never: happy 6th birthday, my dear little La!
27.8. - So... We're back! We enjoyed the travel a lot, but it's always nice to be back home too. EO was... Hot and sandy, that what describes it best in two words. But La couldn't care less, she did great, won both agility and jumping (thanks to Arancha from Spain for the videos!) and had an off-course in the finals, I was simply too slow to handle a sequence after three consecutive tunnels (handling after running contacts is a piece of cake as opposed to three consecutive tunnels!)... Seems like La is back! With that off-course jump and a circle we did to get back to the correct path, she had 3 seconds better time from the rest... Off-course or not, it's always a thrill to run her, what a great little doggy!
25.7. O.k., one last
update before I leave for some competitions and many, many seminars...
- the good news is that La won World Team qualifications and is going to Hamar,
Norway. Lo was not even in the game, because of her cropped ears&docked tail.
- the bad news is that La is positive on Lyme... I had her tested after some
rather unusual symptoms that might not be described in any vet book, but well,
1. our % of off-courses dropped to 0% what is a certain sign that something is
wrong. Our times were still o.k., but only because all of the sudden, I was fast
enough to get a tightest line possible, so... I was right away sure it was not
me, getting perfect, but her, getting slower.
2. she popped out of weave-poles twice and she never ever popped out of weave-poles
in her competition career before, not even as a beginner!
3. she knocked a bar here and there what is not like La at all either
She is on antibiotics now and already doing better, I think. I hope she will be
back to normal soon, I miss running my wild crazy La, I even mis our off-courses
now!
New on the site: two more questions&answers added to
FAQ: My
running contacts
and some new hiking photos. This is my favourite one:
4.7. - Some people asked for some new videos of Bu, so I'm adding one jumping (thanks to Petra!) and one agility (thanks to Bor!) run from recent competitions. She looks better than that in training, competitions are still a scary place for her. - Unlike La, who thinks competitions are organized just so that all those people could see her run, Bu thinks competitions are organized just so that all those dogs could eat her… But she feels more and more comfortable every next time, so…
I also updated “training” and “videos” page a little bit.
27.6. - Finally, after millions of questions on running contacts, I put together a more detailed step by step description on how I train it and you can read it in FAQ: My running contacts article now. But be careful: it's veeery looong. If you want a short description: make it easy enough for a dog to succeed and then just keep repeating the successful performances. It's very easy, but it sure takes some training.
I also added a new agility photo-gallery from 2007 competitions, mostly taken by Iztok Noc and Andraz Cerar. Big thanks to both for the photos!
20.6. - We spent the weekend on a competition in Geel, Belgium, partly to run some courses from this year WC-judges and partly to get Bu used to big and loud competitions. Courses were great, challenging, but nice&fluent for the dogs. To prepare for Norway, we even got some of their weather tooJ (for those of you that haven’t been hiking in Norway for three weeks and only got three not-raining days, it means: RAIN!). Bu did great too, she won both A1 runs and is now A2!
New on the site:
Small – Medium – Large article on differences between height categories or why the fact on how well the dog is trained and how fast he is has more influence on how easy or hard it is to handle him as his size and
a video from everyday life with Lo-La-Bu... And yes, I admit we only did that video in order to use the puppy La video to show off how incredibly cute puppy she was…
6.6. - I'm adding a new photo album with photos from vacations in Sardinia, one of our favourite places to spend vacations, because of beautiful lonely beaches that offer endless walking options, some windsurfing for Bor - and even some agility for me! I didn't know agility exists there and found the competition on Italian calendar by chance, immediately organised vacations around it and ran a really nice and friendly competition there last weekend. Certainly one of the nicest competitions I've been to, thanks to our new Sardinian friends.
23.5. - again thanks to Petra: La's TV ad
The role in this ad was meant for another dog, but since she didn't want to fetch phones, I got an emergency call: "can La fetch phones?" Well, La can fetch anything - and if there is a treat for her, she can fetch even more than that:).
16.5. - thanks to Petra, I finally got Bu's TV ad
5.5. - new video of Bu, playing frisbee (and yes, I know, I can't throw...)
and some new pictures in a photo gallery
4.4. - I added two new videos:
funny tricks video with La and Bu, showing some tricks - watch La's tail, it doesn't stop wagging not even when she is in the air! Yeah, somebody has some excess energy:).
La's agility run in a recent competition that we got from Masha from Trieste. Thanks Masha! La had by far best time, but on a video, we look terribly slow. - Especially me... Have to start running again!
Also, some new frisbee photos from Iztok:
22.3. - I added a new article, Teaching a trick is the least important part of teaching tricks, to my website. I'll also do a new video with some more tricks in short, I've had no time recently, we had 2 shootings for TV-adds, 1 shooting for a TV show and 1 photo-shooting for a publicity with La and Bu in last 14 days... I'll try to get videos of those TV-adds too and put them up.
19.3. - I added a new article on finding a good agility dog in order to answer all the questions on how I chose my dogs and how I found my Breed...
11.3. - We were again in the mountains yesterday, but didn't make any pictures, it was too windy to feel like taking pictures... So instead, I'm adding a new gallery of agility shots from recent trials that I just got from Iztok.
Also, I finally added Our famous cik&cap article to answer all that mailed me with questions on cik&cap turns.
26.2. - Since I get many similar or related questions, I decided to use the answers I send privately to those that mailed me to put them on my website too in order to answer those that from that or another reason didn’t ask, but might be interested nevertheless. I actually already did it with my “Agility is good for the dogs” article, but since I was warned by a friend that on one German forum didn’t quite get the point (or, even more likely: didn’t even read it), I wrote an additional explanation and am also putting it to my site under “Agility is good for the dogs part II”, where I explain why I think starting early is actually BETTER and SAFER for the dogs, so you actually risk LESS as you do if you start with an adult dog. Yes: I do it because I believe it’s in best interest of my dogs.
If you have any other questions, doubts, comments, critics or would just like to express your agreement or disagreement, you’re very welcome to mail me and I’ll try to answer as good as I can (and as soon as I can – seminars period is getting close, so you’ll need to be patient sometimes). Thanks to your feedback, I’ll also be able to add new things to the site that might be in interest of others too, so I’m thanking for everything you have to say already in advance.
24.2. - Today, it was Lo's turn to win. After agility run, La was first and Lo second, but then in jumping, La got eliminated, thanks to me changing handling plans one minute before our start (and I promised to never do it again... like tenth time! - guess what happened every of those ten times...). It was final competition for our Eukanuba Winter Cup, overall results are as such: good old Lo on a first place (with one first, one second and one third place) and crazy little La on second place (with two wins and one elimination) - strange feeling, huh, La? :)
Also, see our new photo gallery with pictures from our recent trips to the snowy mountains. Yeah, we got no snow this year in Ljubljana, one needs to climb to 2000m to find some...
14.2. - I added some new pictures to albums agility, tricks, hiking, winter and Bu. They were taken on our recent trips to mountains and those from agility, on a competition we had last weekend. Of course, La won again, this time with 8.86s better time from the fastest BC...
10.2. - First I would like to thank those that mailed me to express their concern about working puppies, because this gives me an opportunity to talk about my favorite topic: that agility is good for the dogs, their joints, their health, their mind. I strongly believe in that, seeing my dogs happy, healthy and fast till very, very old age. To read more about how good I think agility is, go to an article I just added: Agility is good
2.2. - The dogs on my "running contacts" video are all trained by my method from puppyhood on. Several people were interested in how good it works when retraining - my guess would be that just as good, just that it takes even more time, as every retraining. To be sure, I checked with Olga who is retraining Vigo since my seminar in Poland, that is from beginning of November, 5-6 days per week, 2 sessions per day, 30 repetitions per session. Here is how it looks like now. Not bad at all! Thank you Olga for the video. I hope to add Vigo to "running contacts" video soon!
1.2. – I never bothered to tape our running A-frame since it's very easy after you train running dog-walk, but since several people were asking to see A-frame too, I took a camera to a training today and added a video of Bu's running A–frame.
And since I was already there with a camera, we organized our second La vs. Bu competition. First time, La didn't take it too seriously and so it was Bu that won for half of a second. This time, La took her revenge, saying that no BC can beat her majesty and beat Bu for a second. – What is not bad result for Bu either, La usually beats the fastest BC in competition for at least 2 seconds per course, so... But it's true that Bu is not jumping her full height here yet.
Here you can see La’s run and here, you can see Bu’s.
29.1. – video of Bu, my skate-boarder border, is updated. This is her fourth time on skate-board, so it's not that much to see, but it's really funny, Bu loves it
27.1. – two interviews are added to »our training« site for all of you that were asking how I train running contacts