Mitzi is competing in Rally O and has her Advanced title and two legs of the next (and highest) level. After that my plan was to start in formal obedience.

But I'm having a problem with her focus while in the ring. She seems to be learning that as soon as the leash is off and we are at a show, she will not get any rewards or corrections, and will lag while heeling, sniff and generally become extremely sloppy. She will still do everything, but only with more and more coaxing with each show (in Rally you can repeat commands, and coax the dog with words). She is not distracted by the dogs and show commotion, is not running off, just sniffing the ground, looking around while heeling and not at me and very slow responses.

While training, exactly the opposite is true. We have built up to fewer and fewer rewards using marker training, so she will do a whole routine without a marker release until the end, including off leash, but knows there is that treat at the end, often a jackpot. Her focus is good, lot's of eye contact, stays at heel, and generally acts excited and ready to work. It is only at a show that she acts differently. I jackpot after her work there as well, when we get out of the ring, doesn't seem to matter.

I've been trying to take a step back and mark for briefer sessions of focus, but i'm not sure that is working in this case. I guess I need advice as to how to transition from what seems like successful training, to actual competition.

I don't think she will be able to do formal Ob. till we figure this out... Without being able to repeat a command or coax, well....>rollseyes<
Any advice?
Btw, I sent in this question in to possibly get asked to Michael Ellis for the newsletter videos, but thought I'd ask here as well. Thanks to you all for any help,
Cheers,
Ci

Hi Cindy,

This is one of the issues that people are seeing when progressing from Rally to Obedience. The dogs are used to being in a show setting and getting additional commands so that is what they expect when they enter the obedience ring. Another issue could be stress - are you seeing more of this now that you are in advanced/excellent rally?

If so, it could be a confidence issue in addition to/instead of a reliance on additional commands. What I would suggest is to set up a ring in areas unusual to your dog. Step back and take some baby steps - heel for a few steps and then release your dog and run outside the ring and reward. Repeat and slowly extend the amount of time working before the reward. Hit as many fun matches and run thoughs as you can and do this type of training there as well. Make it fun, make it upbeat, make it interesting, and above all things, do not coax ;-)

FWIW, a couple years ago I was having a similar issue with Frost in that her heeling was not up to snuff when in a competition setting and took an entire ring to the annual Ellis seminar, set it up, as this is what Michael had me do. Two weeks later she made her CD debut with a HIT so it can be effective.

Good luck!

Sh'es simply gotten ringwise!
LOTS and LOTS of fun matches/put through, whatever they're calling them now. She needs to realize that reward/correction is always an option. You can't do that through training only unless you can create the "show" situation.
You could also be hanging back to let her catch up when off lead. That can be confusing to a dog. "Do you want to heel or hang back and see what I'm doing"?
Move on down the road and reward/correct as needed but don't slow down to see what she's doing. It's HER job to keep an eye on you, not the other way around.

There do not seem to be many fun matches around where I live (Vancouver Is. Canada) so the best I can do is go to busy parks and pretend it's a show
I would be leary of working off leash without a little fence around me as they have at shows, though...
Do you think I should only be practicing on leash? When on leash, I have been giving a tug correction for lagging healing, followed by a mark and reward for a few steps of good heeling, but off leash, only marks and rewards.... Should I simply wait for rock solid on leash? What do you do if you have solid on leash and the dog regresses when you go off?

I will definitely get off coaxing at this point. I wanted to be one of those people who had very precise obedience in Rally (there are some), but that does not seem to be happening with this dog. Oh well, very few people out there training MinPins anyway, so I am still proud of my accomplishments

I train 99% off lead with markers now but "in the good old days", unless we were in the competition ring we RARELY trained off lead unless the dog was at the top of his/her game. Even then it was few and far between.
Why set yourself up for mistakes?!!
Wondering if he/she "can do it of lead" should tell you the dog isn't ready.
You might want to go through the routine by yourself, without a dog, in order to get completely familiar with YOUR moves. If your having to think about "how do I make this turn,etc" then you aren't able to put all your concentration in the work.

Bob, I'm not sure if you are suggesting I train 99% off lead as you do now, or on lead as in the past. Could you claify that, please?

To recap, what i'm finding is that she seems to be at the top of her game ON and OFF lead as long as she is NOT in a show ring. Then she is basically blowing me off when we try a show.
The blowing off part has happened gradually over the 11 shows we have been to, starting with mild distractibility on her part, and getting worse and worse, as (I think) she realizes that there isn't much I can do about it while in the ring.
In between shows, I work on focus, and getting better precision, etc. And she acts like an almost perfect angel!!! So frustrating...
I do think that setting up fake dog show scenearios will help, with short fun sessions in the ring, then leave and reward. I wonder if I should also step up my on leash corrections...like let her get to the point where she is ignoring me and then correct her for it.

For you, it sounds like you should stay with the leash work.
Off lead requires a big understanding and good skills with marker training. Most marker trainers also use a bit of correction so a leash would be needed for that.
Reward in the "ring" but do it very randomly. If you reward just outside the ring the dog could figure that out also. She needs to believe that reward or correction is always a possibility.
She may very well be reading off you also. Your getting to the point you expect non compliance. You can bet she can read that in your body language.

That sounds like good advice. Thank you, Bob. I think I totally agree about the body language concept, and I will work on that.

I was also reading some training Q&A's answered by Cindy Rhodes and I think it might be helpful if I retrained the heel, using a different word. Maybe Mitzi is in a bad habit of thinking she only needs to heel properly if asked over and over along with coaxing praise, and a new word would be a command for heeling "right now and I mean it!"

Another thing I need to do is not expect her to be ready till she"s ready. I had a deadline in mind for her entry into CD trials of end of Oct. when there is the Canadian MinPin Specialty in my area this year - prestige, and all that. But I would rather wait until I know she will excel, even if it takes another 6 mo. Or a year or more!
She only needs one more leg of Rally Excellent for the title, so I"ll just focus on that for Oct.