Maestro tries Agility!

I admit it.

I'm definitely the dog owner equivalent of a crazy soccer mom. I schedule all sorts of organized activities for my dog. I've driven an hour to take Maestro to herding lessons (and I've gotten up at 5am to take him to an all day herding clinic!). We've gone to obedience class. We've attended Yappier Hour (an event hosted by a local hotel where dogs and their owners can come to an outdoor bar to mingle and drink cocktails). We have play dates with Maestro's doggy friends. You name it, we've tried it!

I can't help it! I love spending time with Maestro and I'm addicted to trying new things. So the poor little guy is subjected to my every whim when it comes to doggy activities.

So our latest endeavor? Agility! I've ALWAYS wanted to try out agility with Maestro, but I was told I had to wait until he was a year old to start it. As soon as he turned one (last month) I was immediately on the prowl for an affordable agility class.

I stumbled upon a place called "Magical Mutt" and decided to sign Maestro up for their Agility for Fun class.

Well, we've taken two classes so far and we are loving it! The first class was just sort of a dog introduction class. The instructor had us working with our dogs to see where we were in our training and how well they knew basic commands (sit, stay, come, down). I was very proud of Maestro! He did a great job with all of his commands, but that's probably just because he was getting so many treats...

One thing I liked about the class immediately is that there were only two other dogs in the class! So each  one of us got a ton of individual attention. So even though the first class was just the basics Maestro and I still had a great time. I think it's really good for him to have some practice doing his commands when there are other dogs around to distract him. He loves other dogs so sometimes that's a challenge for him.

The second class was a BLAST! We worked on three different obstacles. The first one was the "Pause" table which is just a table where your dog has to either hold a down or sit for five seconds before you cue them off of the table. Maestro had no problem with that! The second obstacle was the jump (the one I was most excited for!) and he picked up on that really quickly too! The last one we did was a hoopy thing...which isn't a real obstacle in agility, but it was good for the dogs to get used to having something above them when jumping through obstacles. At first Maestro just ran around the side of it as if to say "Silly human! I don't have to jump through the hoop to get to you!". But after some encouragement he made it through! Not only that, but the trainer let us try it off leash and he did it!! He didn't even try to run towards the other dogs! Again, I'm sure the abundance of treats kept him focused, but that was still some great progress for him!

I can't wait for next weeks class! If any of you have dogs with extra energy to burn I highly recommend this Agility class! The instructor is great, the content is fun, and it's not too hard to get to either!