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Gridwork and Jumping Day Sunday 11th November 2007 Instructor: Gemma Hanekom
Report by Yvette Curtis! Jump grid report by Yvette 11.11.2007 instructor, Gemma Hanekom The group consisted of Yvette and Skate, Janet and Mac, Kerry and Gem, Joy and Jinty, Naomi and Flea, Karen and Kez, Sue and Oz, Sheila and Fosse, and Michelle and Jester. We started off the session with a small but important discussion on warming dogs up before we do exercises and shows, Gem gave a quick lesson on massage, a very important part of warm up and then cool down and the dogs love it. Then we got down to work, the emphasis was on accuracy and not speed for this session so it would try a few of the faster collies as they would have to think about what they were doing. We started with the so called spider a jump with six foot plastic tubes attached to get the dogs to think about take off and landing, they all coped with this very well and each dog had a different set of problems which gem took on board and adjusted the exercises very well. Then came the grid work, a basic grid of 6 jumps in a straight line of a distance of 6feet apart with the poles on 15-18 inches never any higher. The last time we did this skate treated it as a spread and did two at a time so it was going to be a very interesting time. Every single dog thought about what it was doing and focused on the task and gave some lovely jumping patterns. Then on to bend work, again it could have all gone wrong with the powerful long striding dogs taking two or more jumps at a time but every one of them thought about what they were doing and worked very well. Then the last exercise was another variation on grid work which had two low poles and then we moved the final jump to 15, 18 and 20 feet apart, this was to see if they could adjust the stride pattern and take off point. I can say for myself that I had a very enjoyable afternoon and loved every minute of it, the session catered for all levels and standard of dog and Gem instructed us in a very informative and positive manor. Thanks from myself and skate to gem for organising it. xxx |
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