Lance in 2011

Another year almost gone!  Here's my yearly wrap up video!  The great thing about editing a video is that I can pretend all the frustrations and issues didn't exist and only show the good stuff :)  I took a lot more footage this year so sorry about the 10min length, but of course it easily could have been 30!

I'll write up Vito's year in a few days, but for now here is a look back at Lance's accomplishments in 2011.

Obedience:
We had done one graduate open trial in December and we did a few more in the beginning of the year to earn 2 legs.  Lance gained confidence as we went although we struggled with self doubting on the articles, straight go outs instead of to the glove location, and taking bonus jumps on the directed retrieve.  After a Denise Fenzi seminar in July I made some changes and Lance's problems with articles disappeared!!! Later that month we went to a CDSP trial where Lance earned his CDSP open title and even got a leg towards CDSP Utility.

In September I became brave enough to try our first AKC Utility trial!  We did a few trials where Lance attracted quite the crowd with his happy attitude and we earned our UD this December!!!  


Rally:
Lance didn't do much rally this year as he only needed 1 leg for his APDT RL3 which we earned in April.  He also took over Vito's APDT runs so has 1 double Q towards an ARCH.

Agility:
Poor corgi.  Lance's proofing towards his 4 on the floor was going really well and he was nailing it in trials!  But I was still very unhappy with the safety of Lance's aframe as he would launch and then fold up his leg to smash into his down at the bottom.  In February I decided to go with a running aframe and since I was already retraining I added in the dogwalk.  I spent all summer working on running contacts with him every morning before work.  We made a lot of progress in the dogwalk but then it would fall apart as Lance would start to stress.  Rebuilt it multiple times until I finally decided to give up in September.  And the aframe was just a wreck.  Now since I can't bear the thought of retraining the corgi again, we are going to managed contacts.  No criteria on his part :)  His dogwalk is actually going really well, likely do to all the work put in this summer.  The aframe I'm still not sure how to handle it without him flying into space.

With our contacts retraining, Lance did very few agility trials this past year.  When he did compete we only entered runs without an aframe or dogwalk.  Lance still has a major stuttering issue on the jumps and it hasn't been a priority for me this past year with all the contact training.  It's part of the reason I have decided to focus only on NADAC with him.  I like doing distance training and more hoops mean less jumps.  Although the greater distances between obstacles actually results in more stuttering as Lance seems to do better on twistier courses.

Tricks:
I wasn't very ambitious this year in our trick training.  Several tricks were started, failed, and restarted multiple times.  The attempted tricks:
- Hold a toy in his paws, while sitting up.  Semi accomplished. Lance really gets the concept and reaches for the toy when presented.  He also understands his feet have to come together.  As long as I hold an end, it looks beautiful.  But if I let go Lance tends to spike it to the ground.  Sometimes we have it but usually it's balancing on his chest.  Lance has tried to tell me it's impossible for corgis but I don't believe him.

- Drumming.  Win!  Lance learned to drum his front paws on a cookie tin.  He also thinks he has to drum his back feet at the same time...


- Cover nose with paw.  Fail.  I've wanted this trick with Lance for a long time but just can't get it.  He'll swipe at his nose but has no duration.  Or he'll have duration but without his paw actually making contact.

- Backwards hind foot limp.  Fail.  I managed to get one step backwards while he's holding up his back leg.  But mostly it's a lot of grunting, hopping, and kicking  a nearby dog with his back foot.

Goals for 2012:
Work towards Lance getting his UDX, earn at least half of the QQs by the end of the year.
Work on at least one new idea to fix his forging during heeling, especially on the starts.
Figure out a way to handle his no criteria contacts in agility :)