Vito's 2nd First Day of Agility
In an interesting turn of events, Vito had his 2nd first day of agility class tonight! Since his other class is only 3 weeks, I had just starting emailing other organizations about classes and managed to get into a beginner class on Fridays! It's not technically a puppy agility class, and it's ongoing, but the instructor seemed ok with Vito joining. He is the youngest one there by far and of course is nowhere near their experience, but we had a blast!
I was a little scared when we first started since I didn't know it wasn't the start of a new session and the first thing on the list was a sequence of a-frame, tunnel, and 3 jumps! But when it came my turn they put the bars on the floor and just had Vito run through a curved tunnel and have me do a recall over the zero height jumps. Then they had me do it a couple more times with me running alongside the jumps.
Vito of course had only done a tunnel once before, and it was straight, so he had some fun figuring out what he was supposed to do. At one point he went inside, ran back out the entrance and ran to the exit where he proceded to enter and turn around to face me. What a thinker!
Most of the night I separated off from the group and worked with Vito on a wobble board, plank, more tunnels, tire, and the bottom of the a-frame. He did really well and was so excited the entire time. Since it was just me, I was able to take the time to shape him and just let him think through what I wanted him to do. Of course with all the shaping we had done already it went really quick.
Vito did more sequences in this first class then Lance had done the first 2.5 classes he took. So this is definitely a fast moving class, but at the same time I'm not worried. Vito did great, and they are ok with me and Vito going off and just working on some things by ourselves. I think Lance would actually fit in great with the group of dogs and what they are doing, so I am jealous that Lance's own class is moving so slow when he is clearly ready for more.
Everyone loved Vito and I really like the instructor. She is very impressed by Vito's drive and fast learning. I think that I will learn a lot from her as well, and maybe when Lance's current session is over I will decide to move Lance to a class with her.
