Those darned Lead-outs!
How to develop a reliable Stay at the startline.

Hi all, Just a quick(ish) note on stays. On Friday night we were practicing lead-outs in a number of the exercises and I noticed that some dogs were not well proofed on this. The first step to an excellent wait at the start line is training it away from equipment first. You also need to be very clear what it is that you are asking of your dog when it is waiting- if they are waiting in a stand, your criteria may be that your dog cannot move its front feet, so when training you do not reward (or allow the dog to continue) if they move their front feet- ever. Same for the sit, if your criteria is that they can move their front feet but their bums must stay attached to the ground, then you only reward stays where that criteria is met. Each time you compromise your criteria for what a wait means for your dog you make it harder to be reliable on the agility field.

When training the stay ensure you yo-yo back and forth between distance away from the dog and the time they need to wait. Also vary your releases- sometimes release them to you, at other times go back to them, and sometimes release them to a thrown toy. In doing this make sure you also vary the way you reward- sometimes reward by returning to the dog and at other times throw the reward back to them so that they know they can be rewarded from a distance.

Once your dog can do a great stay away from equipment and in various surroundings- at home in the lounge room, in the backyard, at the park; then introduce a set of wings around 15 metres from where your dog will be staying. But don't lead out all the way to them, start with a 2m lead out build back to a 10m lead out and then gradually move the wings in closer to you and the dog until you can stand between them. Then move the wings between yourself and your dog until the wings are only a stride from your dog and you release your dog through them to you for the reward. Ensure you throw the reward back to them at times too, so they don't always anticipate coming forward through the wings. Then take the wings back out again to the 15m and add a jump rail and reward your dog for coming to you rather than going out to the jump. Then gradually bring it in as a jump until you can stand immediately in front of it and release your dog and they come to you for the reward. Then move it in front of you and release your dog over the hurdle. Then increase this to two hurdles with the second one out back etc. Make sure that you mix up throwing the reward back to your dog where they are on their stay and release them to get the toy while you run back to play with them, with the alternative of calling your dog to you and rewarding them with the toy when they come.

For some dogs this process won't take too long. For dogs very focussed on the obstacles and who take their rewards from doing jumps, this process might take longer. But remember that each time you run an exercise when your dog really truly didn't wait for the release then you are undoing all of your hard work. Each time they break a stay, even by a tenth of a second, you need to put back in a minimum of five reinforcements for doing it correctly away from the exercise before trying the exercise again. If you want reliability in the long term make sure you stay goal focussed in the short term rather than focussed on the outcome of completing an exercise. So the goal is the dog only leaving the stay on your command 100% of the time. Hope this helps you in proofing those stays.

Excellent control on the start line will also help you when training stays on contacts too.

Cheers
Tracey