Pre-agility or Agility 1?

cmae

cmae

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We recently met with an amazing trainer in town and are supposed to start classes with her next week. We were originally going to do pre-agility (basically flatwork and other foundation work), but Cruz is the only dog signed up for it. She has offered to continue on with the class despite this, but has also said that we are more than welcome to join Agility 1 (no jumps, obstacles at low heights).

Cruz is now 6 months old, excelled in basic obedience and we have been working on read end awareness, core strengthening and targeting with him on our own time. There are only 2 other dogs in Agility 1, so I'm sure we'd still get tons of one on one time.. but I'm not sure which class to enroll in. Any thoughts?
 
I'd go with foundation. I'd be much more prone to re-doing a foundations class than skipping one altogether. Foundations skills are super critical, and though I have no doubts that Cruz could catch up with the class, you might be rushing some of those critical skills.

We didn't do a ton of foundation with Bentley (my first agility dog) and we've been playing catch up for the past 6 years. There are some habits we just haven't been able to break.
 
I would go with foundation class, too. I believe that a dog can't have too much foundation work.

My puppy, Envy, has actually done 2 separate foundation classes. We did a 10 week one at one place and then a class opened up at my normal training place with an instructor I really like. So we did that 20 week one as well.
 
You want a dog to have strong foundations. Everything else is built upon that.

I rushed Edan through my club's lower levels in 32 weeks (4 classes 8 weeks each) and, looking back, I wish I'd have spent more time in at least one of them. I was in a hurry to get out on the field and play agility and really didn't understand how critical those foundations were until after the fact.

I've had to go back and re-teach turning things that should have been proofed in foundations. Don't get me wrong, Edan's a great agility dog and I wouldn't trade him for the world but I could have done things better.

One thing I hear a LOT from various trainers locally, not just my own club but while talking to them at trials, is that too many people rush through the foundations and don't put enough effort into making sure those skills are strong. The foundations aren't as fun as running a sequence with your dog but without those foundations, running the sequence becomes at least ten times more difficult.

Take your foundations class; re-take it multiple times in fact. It really is that important.
 
I started Declin in the foundations class mainly because everyone that I talked to has nothing but nice things to say about the instructors. And I am so glad that I did, because originally I was considering skipping it and going straight to agility I!

He is the youngest in the class at 9.5 months, with another two that are 10 months, and then we have a few dogs that are 2 years old and up! (But their people have all done agility before… I'm the newbie.)

He absolutely loves the class, and looks forward to going every week. I'm repeating the same class again for the next session because there are still things that we collectively need to work on, but I'm sure he won't mind.
 
I vote for the foundation class as well. Celtic took 2 and he just started beginners 4 weeks ago. All the dogs in the class that took the foundation puppy class are head and shoulders ahead of the dogs that just started at beginners in terms of confidence.
 
Thank you all! We are going with your advice and starting foudations this Tuesday :smile2:
 
I wish we had a foundations class. We've been doing some body awareness stuff, etc. but I really like the class environment and learning from people who are experienced. At the facility I go to, you need to take beginning agility, beginning obedience, and intermediate obedience before moving into intermediate agility 1.

I met a girl with a mini Aussie in our beginning agility class, and we both have the same aspirations with agility. We were in the same beginning obedience class, and we're again enrolled in the same intermediate obedience class, so we're both on the same track, and both our dogs love the sport so far. In contrast, there was another lady with an Aussie who had taken beginning obedience before the first agility class. I was snooping the class roster in the last session, and it turns out she skipped both intermediate obedience and intermediate agility 1 and went straight into intermediate agility 2/3. Maybe she took private lessons, I'm not sure. But it will be interesting to see how that team progresses.
 
Ok, I must admit.. I didn't want to do foundations because I didn't think it would be as "fun" as introducing the obstacles. I was very wrong. I LOVE our instructor. She made everything into a fun game for both pup and human.. and who doesn't want to play with their pup for a whole hour?! It was so great to see how happy and excited Cruz was the whole class. I knew Cruz had some drive because his favourite game is tugs, but man does this boy have DRIVE. The kid would have tugged for the whole class if we let him.. we barely made a dent in our treat bag.

On top of all this, I didn't realize how much Chris and I really needed foundations. Left, right, wraps, rear and front crosses.. what?! We will be working on a lot with Cruz this week. Excited to see where this class takes us :smile2:
 
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