Great stuff, and yeah, I had Echo’s leather slip collar, not that the “slip” ever moves, but they said flat collars or a harness.

I think the tunnels will be interesting - can’t keep him out of the culverts on our mountain walks but the chutes and tunnels may be a little different. My only apprehension is the teeter totter thing; he hasn’t had any exposure to that type of moving apparatus.

And he’s going to be slow. He’s big and methodical, very intentional with his moves. Probably much like Dexter.

And nice, a private agility trainer would be ideal, but unheard of where I’m at. The lady who trains the actual agility class has titled 3 of her own dogs; I know nothing about the pre-agility trainer.

It should be fun though; I’m really looking forward to it. Thanks for the inspiration!!

Very cool CJ -do let us know how it goes..
Our "Intro" class showed the folks all the equipment and let the dogs experience them. These were just two sessions and just conducted to give people a "flavor" of the apparatus.
Next came the real "Foundation" work -front and rear crosses, handling concepts, "get it and leave it" games -some cavaletti work for foot awareness -like that. No real equipment yet until we had all these important concepts. These were conducted over 6 weeks.
Only NOW are we really into the A-frame, beginning weaves and jumps and we are working primarily off leash so this is where obedience and solid temperment comes in. I've often said that a dirty little secret in agility is lack of strong obedience and in fact a lot of my ongoing AKC obedience work flies a bit in face of the agility concepts, which is much more focused on speed and drive...just IME here.
Shiva is much slower and cautious (read: giant baby) than the little Pom..and I won't even get into the border collie -LOL!

Have fun and looking foward to hearing about your experience!

Hey Hilarie, I think this class is much like the foundation course you’re talking about. It’s six weeks as well, one night a week. They didn’t have any of the equipment there; this was just their big summer sign up night.

They run a bunch of different classes too. Fly Ball and Rally O, along with all the obedience classes. Agility definitely having a pre-requisite of some solid obedience. A breeze for my little pumpkin.

I have an A-frame too that hubby built, he's been up and over it a few times. It's heavy though and I hate dragging out. Gonna get hubby to set it up in a good spot for the summer.

Also going to see if they can hook us up with a CGC tester. He’s already passed some pretty tough testing with flying colors; we might as well get him the letters for it.

And I sure hear you on the border collies. I have absolutely no expectations for him in the agility arena. Can’t see him competing at any level, he’s just not built for it but he seems to enjoy going through the motions and they’re more than willing to take us on, so we’ll play.

Thanks for the encouragement, will definitely let you know how it goes.



ETA: Sorry Ariane, didn't mean to flood your thread. There were a couple of beginner agility threads going so I thought I'd just hop on to yours.

I hope you keep us updated on your progress too. We can all compare notes.