First Rally Class

[Tanya]

Enjoy! hope your class is better than the one I am finishing up this weekend (it was more like "advance novice" haha).

I enjoy rally, I know it was time after lots of agility to do something more precise and calm (but fun) with Penny!

Have fun! The first few weeks can be hard because you are reading and learning signs so don't be surprised if you go left when it says right, or sit when it says down. Everyone goes through it and it gets easier!

what do you mean the first few weeks? I still do that LOL!

And there are few men in ANY of the classes I take. Any classes. Basic obedience, agility, Rally. There is the odd man with their girlfriend/wife. once in awhile I see the man actually taking the class on their own with the dog. But the dog world is seemingly mostly women
With the exeption of maybe the hunt training class I took years ago

[windycanyon]

I just started teaching a new Intro to Rally last night. Small class, but that is fine since it's a new way of doing it. All of the ones I've been to in the past are like Tanya's, and I have felt sorry for both the owner and the dog since the owner is spending far too much of her focus on the signs, and not the dogs who end up being dazed and confused. I have taken classes where some of the first signs on courses were things like Sit Down Walk Around or the Left About Turn (schutzhund turn) and thought to myself, oh my.... talk about skipping the ABCs and just diving into a book.

Our class last night was so "easy peasy" I hope it wasn't too disappointing, but I had to get some of the basic mysteries out of the way first... like signs will be on the right unless it's a directional change, and yes, you get scored for your heeling in between the signs too! Anyhow my first 2 courses were only 4 signs total (incl Start and Finish). That is all (imo) a first time rally competitor needs to worry about. Keep it simple, group similar type concepts together... And to be honest, a couple of the people in the class will still likely find it challenging as they need to figure out how to improve their relationships w/ the dogs.

As for guys in class, I also started teaching the Open obedience class last night (both classes will have a co-instructor in 2 wks who will take the month of Feb for me since I have puppies coming!). I do have 1 male in the Open class, but he's a judge who is teaching the class I have my 9 mo old in (basically a BN/ CD prep class). I focused heavily on retrieve foundations last night (using Kanzi as my demo dog) because NO ONE around here teaches good retrieve foundations in obedience class. I made the comment about w/ puppy field training, etc, men seemed to have the hardest time PLAYING w/ their pups because they seem more self conscious. He laughed... it's true in general! Hopefully you are not from that mold. I've watched a lot of men in the obed ring do VERY well (one is now aspiring to judge), so it's a matter of communication and relationship w/ your dog. You should be having fun while you are doing all this. Gone are the days of that nauseous nervousness for me, and THANK GOD for that! When you can learn to laugh at yourself and your dog (when appropriate), you are miles ahead of all the others. Hope you have fun!

[JoAnn]

Rally is fun. You can talk to your dog, pat your leg, give lots of encouragement. Just be patient and enjoy learning and above all..have fun!

[JenC]

Our trainer actually said to NOT pat your leg or clap or snap....but to use your hands and talk only. Once you get up to higher levels you can't pat anymore.

[Annette47]

It's funny about dog people being mostly women, as it appears that way around here, too. Although I do see a fair number of men handling at Obedience trials (still a definite minority though), but in almost 20 years, I've only ever had 1-2 in class with me and they didn't last long.

[barry581]

It's funny about dog people being mostly women, as it appears that way around here, too. Although I do see a fair number of men handling at Obedience trials (still a definite minority though), but in almost 20 years, I've only ever had 1-2 in class with me and they didn't last long.

That's pretty funny! I bet they were just intimidated by all the women!!! I'm way tougher than that! A few years back I took yoga classes. Over the course of two years, I was the only guy in the class with about 10-12 women. I really liked that class..........