Training for Advanced Teamwork

I have been considering  training for AKC's new Advanced Teamwork class ever since Lance finished his UD.  The UDX is still our goal but I'm really attracted to training some new exercises!

I don't know if training some of the exercises is the correct decision based upon where Lance is in his training.  He is still a very green dog when it comes to competing in open and utility and I know that some of this work will only confuse him more.  I was originally only going to train some of the exercises but I am now very tempted to just jump in and have fun!

I'm not making it a priority, but I have been playing around with a few of the exercises every now and then for the last few months.

1. A distance stand from sit and down-  Lance's stand was pretty iffy.  Unlike the other dogs who do a beautiful kick back even at a distance, Lance tends to take a tentative step forward or sometimes just briefly lifts his butt.  I've thought about quickly reteaching the stand from scratch with him but for now I'm just expanding where he's at.  So far it's going pretty well and he can stand from 10ft away and so far I'm ok with the stepping forward into it.  Vito has a beautiful kick back stand at a distance :)

2. Sit in motion- Lance has a great verbal down from all the fun drop games we play and a great verbal stand from utility.  Sit blew his mind but he's doing better and only rarely folds into his down now.

3. Sit after a retrieve- This went surprisingly easy for him!  I was prepared for him to try drop it as soon as I gave a sit cue but he never has!  Mainly we are working on distance as he tends to take a step or two after I call sit; or if I try and call sit as soon as he has it I end up being too early and he sits before it's in his mouth.  I'm a little scared training this might bite us in the ring, so I'm only doing this with non dumbbell items.

4.Drop on recall to Baseball gloves- Currently practicing a baby version of this exercise as I'm starting him in the middle.  It didn't take much training to get him to go out to glove 1 & 3.  With glove #2 he's doing well but I'm still stepping into his path as if I'm bowling him backwards.  We're currently playing with understanding of glove #2 vs glove #3 as both of my signals use the right arm.

5.  Call to heel while still and moving- Having him join me in heeling while I'm moving is proving to be no challenge.  While I am still he needs me to look over my shoulder or he comes front.

6. Go out to cone- alternating cuing a sit or a down, or if I'm close enough, a stand.  At first I was having him touch the cone but it morphed into Lance going out around it.  I don't know that I care until I see more videos of other people doing it.