Protection Benchmark

In order to get ready for the July trial, we did a protection benchmark study with Kane a few weekends ago. It sounds very scientific, but it's not. :-) We basically ran through the Schutzhund 1 protection from start to finish. With the e-collar (wouldn't want him to flip out completely). Overall it went well. Nothing majorly crazy. By splitting the exercise up into all the individual steps (in my notebook) and then comparing impressions with my trainer Richard and my friend Julie, we pieced together a plan of things that we need to work on. Here it is:

Running 1 Blind - Good. Work on true blind search (come back to me) vs just running from blind 1 to 2.
Blind approach - Good, no nudging in blind.
Bark & Hold - Good, solid.
Heel Away - Needs work. Blind obedience. (we're not doing a call out)
Setup for escape - Needs work. Blind obedience.

Escape - Good
Out - Good
Reattack - Good
Drive - Good
Out - Ok - he tends to out before I say so. I need to time that better.
Pick-up - Good, but could use some work.
Heeling down the field - Good
Setup for courage test - Good (I need to know what I can and cannot do here!)Courage test - Good
Out - Good
Drive - Good
Out - Good

Pickup - Good
Setup for side transport - Ok, needs some work with heeling
Side Transport - Ok, needs some work with slowing down
Halt - ok, should sit sooner
Turnover - Good

Now we know what to work on! Onward!