Here’s a thing you can go test this week, pulled from this month’s Agility Challenge handling challenge topic, ‘rear crosses on the flat’. Four obstacles, about ten minutes.
Here’s the course map for you:
Out of the tunnel at 2, there is a rear cross ‘on the flat’ before jump 3. That is the black dotted line. See how it swings out to the X and then comes back? The X is a piece of tape on the ground, or a scuff in the dirt. It is nothing. It is a spot.
The red dotted line is what actually happens the first few times.
The dog comes out of that tunnel, sees jump 3, and GOES. Never comes anywhere near the X.
And here’s the part I really want you to notice. Most handlers go straight for jump 3 too. Both of you drifting toward the same obstacle, and then wondering why the turn didn’t happen.
That’s the whole thing in miniature
The plan says rear cross on the flat. The dog in front of you says I’ve already picked the jump and I’m going. And if you run the plan anyway, you get a dog who lands going the wrong way, and a handler who decides she needs a better system.
You might not need a better system. You might have needed to notice, about two strides earlier, that your dog had already made up their mind.
That’s not a hole in your training. That’s a listening problem. And the fix isn’t another drill, it’s slowing down enough to see what your dog is telling you BEFORE it turns into a wrong turn.
What to actually do
Pick your spot before you start. Tape, a cone, a scuff in the dirt, whatever you’ve got. Then send to the tunnel, call your dog’s name as they come out, and drive toward your spot. Not toward the jump. The spot.
If your dog keeps peeling off toward the jump anyway, take the jump out entirely. Tunnel, call their name, run straight, reward them for staying with you. Do that until they believe you’re actually going straight and they’re charging along beside you. Then put the rear cross on the flat back in.
Go get them to the X first. THEN cue the jump.
It’s going to feel clunky at first. That’s completely normal. It looks simple, and it IS simple, but it isn’t easy. Keep at it and you’ll both get more fluid. 🙂
Rear crosses ‘on the flat’ are what we’re all working on this month, where Build a Skill starts with no dog at all and builds up from the footwork. The whole system lives inside The Agility Challenge. The door is here.