1. Pivots - Let's Get Started
Welcome to our pivot workshop! If you remember, please start each new workshop thread with “Pivots”, so people can locate them if they are only here to participate in the workshop. Thanks!
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Here are the list of CRO pivots. (The 90 and 180 pivots are also found in all other rally venues.)
All except the last exercise - 360 in Place. Dog Inside. - require the handler to pivot in place and the dog to stay in Heel (or Side) position. For the last one the handler moves forward around the dog while the dog pivots on his/her front paws.
I classify the pivots as easy and not-so-easy – or Dog Moves Forward and Dog Moves Backwards.
Here’s my breakdown, and I’ll use Heel position as the example since that’s what most people on the list use as their default position. (For Side position, switch Left and Right throughout the list.)
Dog Moves Forward (easy)
Level II – Stop. 360 in Place. Dog Outside.
Level III - Pivot 90 Right, Pivot 180 Right
Level IV - Pivot 270 Right
Dog Moves Backwards (not-so-easy)
Level III - Pivot 90 Left, Pivot 180 Left
Lever IV - Pivot 270 Left
Dog Pivots on Front Paws (pretty easy!)
Level IV – Stop. 360 in Place. Dog Inside
One other sign is relevant, and that is the Level V sign Stop (Stand). Back Around Handler in which the handler is stationary and the dog backs around the handler. The dog’s movement in the same as in the left pivots in Heel position in which the dog must move backwards to stay in Heel position.
Does anyone know of other signs (CRO or otherwise) that should be in the above list for us to consider during the workshop? Please post!
Let’s think about goals for our dogs and ourselves for this workshop (next e-mail).
Jude
In our workshops, we have tried to set goals to work towards and, hopefully, accomplish by the end of the workshop. Nancy’s “Managing Your Mind” workshop had a lot of detail on goal setting, and setting goals is one of my favorite ways to get to where I want to go – in dog training and other pursuits.
Before we set our goals, let’s assess where we are. Over the weekend, try each of the pivots with your dog(s) and make some notes of your observations. What do you like or dislike, and what things need to improve or change?
I assumed both my dogs could pivot left just fine in Heel position. But I discovered that Dusty doesn’t not know how to pivot left, even though he knows how to side pass towards me in Heel position. That’s a similar movement for the dog, but not identical and even though the concept is the same (stay in Heel position), he doesn’t see it that way! So that was a surprise for me.
Misty does all her left pivots and also can back around me from Heel position (CCW – counterclockwise) while I’m still or turning CW or turning with her. Yes! I checked last night and she does all these – it’s not my imagination as it was with Dusty.
I’m going to try all the pivots with both dogs and make some notes. Then I’ll set goals for the workshop. I eventually want my dogs to pivot left and right in both Heel position and Side position, because we are working in the Performance Division of CRO as well as doing freestyle. In the Traditional Division of CRO, the dogs do not switch sides at all, so you may only want to work on pivots in Heel position (or Side if that’s your preferred position).
I should also mention that in CRO, each exercise on a course must be performed correctly with one retry allowed. For pivots, that means the dogs MUST stay in Heel position. They cannot snake around to get into Heel position. At this time, points are lost in other venues for snaky pivots, but some day – who knows???!!! Anyway, good pivots look awesome and I believe every team can do them with practice and smart training.
SO, your assignment, should you choose to accept it is to
- Try all the pivots with your dogs. (If you can video this, it will help you later A LOT! And if you want to share your video clips or pieces of them, that helps everyone.)
- Jot down your observations.
- Consider where you would like to be by May 15ish (we may go longer if there is a need for it).
- Define your ultimate goal(s) and write them down.
I’ll be doing my homework and will post the outcome.
PLEASE POST your notes/goals, too. We all learn from each other and seeing other issues, goals, ideas, etc. is a big help to everyone.
Thanks! Questions, comments, ideas – please post.
Jude
Here are two great examples of the same team doing both a correct rally left pivot and a platform pivot. The dog (Jessie) knows both exercises, and the handler (Donna, who is on this list) knows how to teach both as separate exercises. Many people start pivot work using a platform and that is not going to teach the dog the correct body movements for rally pivots.
- CARO Rally O 24. 90 degree pivot left -clicker chaining tutorial www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILG8VjdFCJQ
- Donna and Jessie doing pivots around Jessie's front feet www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChS7AMJuWFo
- 90 Pivot Right (in Heel) same concept as left pivot, but easier (Dog Moving Forward) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSRSCuGLb2U
I'll be posting these again later in the workshop when we talk about footwork and some other things. I really like Donna's videos.
Jude
Pivots (The Old Guard Fife & Drum Corps - The Virginia Tattoo). This pivot style would be legal in all USA venues (that Australian judge Jenny encountered wouldn't like it, though) but don't lift your knees too high in AKC now that they don't want handlers to look "unnatural"!! The first 8 pivot times in the clip are listed.
0:27, 0:39, 0:51, 1:03, 1:21, 1:28, 1:33, 1:40
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Pivots (Black Diamond Senior PDR). A variety of pivot styles (and really entertaining!). Can you see which foot is the pivot foot and when both feet are pivot points?
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Jude
5. Rally Pivots Are Not Dog Pivots
6. Video Critique
Lynn, you have a great floor on which to practice pivots. You can put the ball of your foot on the center of a square and then check at the end of the pivot to see whether it remained there during the entire pivot.
Lily is sticking with you. See where she is backing up to stay in Heel, which is correct. She should not be pivoting on her front feet for this exercise, so don't do the platform/pot work and expect a correct pivot.
I would pivot a little more slowly so she can stay with you instead of catching up when you stop. With practice, she will get better at her part of the job.
As for the sit. You will understand if you read the Pivot descriptions. In most venues, the dog must sit before and after the pivot. In CRO, the dog can sit or stand when the team stops to get ready for the pivot and also when the pivot is completed. For example, here is the Pivot Left 90 description.
Pivot Left 90 Degrees: The team stops. The dog may stand or sit at the handler's side. The handler pivots (in place) 90 degrees to the left and stops. The dog may stand or sit at the handler's side. Dog must stay in position (Heel or Side) as the handler pivots.
It's fine (for CRO) to start in a stand and end in a sit, or vice versa. If you may do other rally venues than CRO, it's best to teach a sit at the start and end so the dog is used to pivoting from and into a sit.
Jude
Lynn wrote:...I don't exactly know what a pivot is, despite the wonderful videos and the written descriptions.
I attempted to pivot on the ball of my foot and on my heel as suggested in Donna's videos. (Hi, Donna!) but I don't understand where the Sit fits in.
7. Dumb Question?
Ed, that should be fine in AKC, but as we know there are some judges that are finicky about one thing or another. Pie plate steps may be the way to go as the feet get larger! But I think the judges are watching both the handlers feet and the dogs movements. With the split focus, six inches may be no big deal at all. Still, I get your point!
5. Rally Pivots Are Not Dog Pivots
Above is an example of a popular way to supposedly teach pivots, including rally pivots. But these dogs are not doing correct rally pivots and are not learning the correct movements to do them properly. Again, I am talking about the 90, 180, and 270 pivots that appear in CRO Levels III and IV and in other venues (90 and 180 only).
If you watch the end of the clip, where Emily is showing uses of this movement you will see that when the dogs are backing around the handler (which is the same movement they will do in a rally pivot) they are not doing the exercise taught on the clip. Their front paws are not stationary, as they are on the book. (P.S. I LOVE Emily Larlham. Her free videos are great and I have her two DVD sets, as well. I just don't think this is a good way to teach dogs to pivot for rally and people don't understand that!)
Look at the difference in these two Pivot clips (below) from Donna (on our list) and her girl Jessie. In Heel, Jessie walks backward to stay in Heel during the left pivot. Watch her front legs. They do NOT stay in place – they move backwards, as do her rear legs. For the right pivot, Jessie walks forward using all four feet- no pivoting by Jessie, only by Donna.
The third clip is Jessie doing pivots on an object. This is the same exercise shown on Emily's clip. Obviously, Jessie knows how to pivot on her front paws and also how to move backwards to stay in Heel while her handler pivots. And Donna, too, knows the difference. These are two separate behaviors and require different skills as well as different muscle memory. The exercises needs to be taught separately.
Dogs need to learn both exercises for CRO (because of the Level IV sign #6, "Stop. 360 in Place. Dog Inside"), but the dog pivoting is not a separate exercise in any other rally venue. What it can be used for in all venues is tighter turns and teaching hind end awareness, which makes it a very useful exercise.
90 Pivot Left (in Heel): Donna and Jessie
90 Pivot Right (in Heel) : Donna and Jessie
Donna and Jessie doing turns and pivoting around Jessie's front paws
After we talk about our goals and handler footwork, we'll go over some methods to teach correct rally pivots. I have more clips lined up! If anyone has some, please send me the links. Thanks!
Jude
Lynn, you have a great floor on which to practice pivots. You can put the ball of your foot on the center of a square and then check at the end of the pivot to see whether it remained there during the entire pivot.
Lily is sticking with you. See where she is backing up to stay in Heel, which is correct. She should not be pivoting on her front feet for this exercise, so don't do the platform/pot work and expect a correct pivot.
I would pivot a little more slowly so she can stay with you instead of catching up when you stop. With practice, she will get better at her part of the job.
As for the sit. You will understand if you read the Pivot descriptions. In most venues, the dog must sit before and after the pivot. In CRO, the dog can sit or stand when the team stops to get ready for the pivot and also when the pivot is completed. For example, here is the Pivot Left 90 description.
Pivot Left 90 Degrees: The team stops. The dog may stand or sit at the handler's side. The handler pivots (in place) 90 degrees to the left and stops. The dog may stand or sit at the handler's side. Dog must stay in position (Heel or Side) as the handler pivots.
It's fine (for CRO) to start in a stand and end in a sit, or vice versa. If you may do other rally venues than CRO, it's best to teach a sit at the start and end so the dog is used to pivoting from and into a sit.
Jude
Lynn wrote:...I don't exactly know what a pivot is, despite the wonderful videos and the written descriptions.
I attempted to pivot on the ball of my foot and on my heel as suggested in Donna's videos. (Hi, Donna!) but I don't understand where the Sit fits in.
Ed, that should be fine in AKC, but as we know there are some judges that are finicky about one thing or another. Pie plate steps may be the way to go as the feet get larger! But I think the judges are watching both the handlers feet and the dogs movements. With the split focus, six inches may be no big deal at all. Still, I get your point!
I'm going to record some footwork today (close up of feet only) and you may see something else that you'd like to do. The pivot point will be the center of the circle. So, if it's the ball of one foot, the other foot it going to be defining the circumference of the circle. The "perfect" pivot point may be the point in between both feet, and there is footwork for that. Then each foot is moving around the circumference of the circle.
I think once each of us gets good footwork for ourselves, we will be in good shape to use it forever without thinking. How nice for our dogs if we can focus only on them while we pivot.
Jude
Ed wrote:
8. Footwork
So pivoting on the ball of the left foot ...That's certainly what I would call a pivot, but at least with my big feet, that would NOT be on a plate and would move me half a foot to the right as the left foot stays in place. Much easier and more intuitive than what I've been doing, but is it going to cost points?
8. Good Example of Workshop Goals
I took some time yesterday and today to work with all three of my "active" dogs to see where they are with pivots.
It was definitely interesting!! Here is what I found with Speedy (reports on Dean and Tessa to follow later)
Speedy did well with his right pivots. He did flare himself out on the sit at the end of each pivot. If he were a young dog, or if he were actively competing in Rally, I would be working with him to sharpen that up and bring him back into heel, but he's retired from Rally, and we don't use these kinds of pivots (with the sit) in Freestyle, so I honestly don't care that he does that. He did the pivots well, and he's happy, so I'm happy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ow6_naGHLuI
When we practice these throughout the workshop, I will omit the sitting for him.
The lefts didn't go as well. He can do them, but he doesn't hold heel position as he does them anymore - he moves with me at about a 30 - 45 degree angle away from me. I have actually dropped inside pivots from his Freestyle routines because of that, although it is kind of pretty when he pivots, but is at a bit of an angle from me. It didn't look like it was meant to be that way, though, so we don't do them anymore, except in demo where nobody cares about things like that.
Throughout this workshop, I plan to work with him on left pivots for fitness, but not to try to get them to any competition level.
He was awesome at them when he was younger. That's enough!
However, Speedy is the only one of my dogs who actually does the backwards circle around me. Only with a lure. I have started this with both Speedy and Dean in an x-pen, having them offer the movement, but I've never trained it to fluency. Dean can't even do it with the lure, he can only offer the behavior in the x-pen. But Speedy can do this with some visual help.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9uJeCiqfvg
I didn't try the one with him where I move around him and he pivots in place. Maybe we will try that another time, for the sake of art. He might actually be able to do it.
BTW, I did do all of this on both sides (except the circle, which I only work with Speedy off my right (it was going to be a "right side move" for him), but I only did video of the left side work for most of it because of time.
Speedy will have two goals for this workshop.
1. Work left and right pivots twice a week for fitness, however he is comfortable doing them
2. Work the circle around to try to train it to fluency
I believe, even now, that Speedy could actually finish learning that move. How fun would that be?
Kristine
It was definitely interesting!! Here is what I found with Speedy (reports on Dean and Tessa to follow later)
Speedy did well with his right pivots. He did flare himself out on the sit at the end of each pivot. If he were a young dog, or if he were actively competing in Rally, I would be working with him to sharpen that up and bring him back into heel, but he's retired from Rally, and we don't use these kinds of pivots (with the sit) in Freestyle, so I honestly don't care that he does that. He did the pivots well, and he's happy, so I'm happy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ow6_naGHLuI
When we practice these throughout the workshop, I will omit the sitting for him.
The lefts didn't go as well. He can do them, but he doesn't hold heel position as he does them anymore - he moves with me at about a 30 - 45 degree angle away from me. I have actually dropped inside pivots from his Freestyle routines because of that, although it is kind of pretty when he pivots, but is at a bit of an angle from me. It didn't look like it was meant to be that way, though, so we don't do them anymore, except in demo where nobody cares about things like that.
Throughout this workshop, I plan to work with him on left pivots for fitness, but not to try to get them to any competition level.
He was awesome at them when he was younger. That's enough!
However, Speedy is the only one of my dogs who actually does the backwards circle around me. Only with a lure. I have started this with both Speedy and Dean in an x-pen, having them offer the movement, but I've never trained it to fluency. Dean can't even do it with the lure, he can only offer the behavior in the x-pen. But Speedy can do this with some visual help.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9uJeCiqfvg
I didn't try the one with him where I move around him and he pivots in place. Maybe we will try that another time, for the sake of art. He might actually be able to do it.
BTW, I did do all of this on both sides (except the circle, which I only work with Speedy off my right (it was going to be a "right side move" for him), but I only did video of the left side work for most of it because of time.
Speedy will have two goals for this workshop.
1. Work left and right pivots twice a week for fitness, however he is comfortable doing them
2. Work the circle around to try to train it to fluency
I believe, even now, that Speedy could actually finish learning that move. How fun would that be?
Kristine
At 4:25-4:35, pivoting must stay in place (handler). Dog has to stay in Heel. Ruthann McCaulley, multiple venue rally judge and author of Doodle by Design (downloadable rally e-book).
In Rally, the most important thing about pivots is
probably to distinguish them from turns. In a pivot, there is no
forward, backward, or lateral motion by the handler: the handler turns
in place. (In a turn, or a circle, or a 270 right/left, the handler is
moving forward.)
Pivots 90 and 180 right and left pivots by various students with remarks by Ruthann. Second half of the video is stable video, before that it is rocky! Worth watching for Ruthann's comments and demo of good and bad handler pivoting.
At 7:30 to 8:10, she is using the leash to help the dog move backwards around her (her demo dog already knows this, though!).
Jude
9. Pivot Blooper
Here's the pivot blooper:
The teams pivot point was on Stella's hind legs! Whoops!!
And here;s the team performing on a Level V course after a week or so of concentrating on footwork and pivoting. The pivots are at 1:19 (a 270 left pivot in Heel) and 2:10 (a 90 left pivot in Side). Sandy is pivoting on the ball of her left foot. Yay!!
What an improvement!
Jude
10. More Footwork
10. More Footwork
Even though I knew what I wanted to do, my feet did not necessarily follow my instructions as you will see. And I think I left out the 180 Right on one of the options.
However, I hope everyone can get the gist of each option. What did I forget?? Feel free to post more clips with more options.
My favorite is the last one in the clip, and that's what I teach in class. I also really like the pivots on the ball of the inside foot (the first one in the clip) but you can't do it well on a rug or a surface with a lot of traction.
So now I have my footwork selected and I will practice it over the weekend. Even though I teach, I do not practice my footwork. Of course, my dogs are only in CRO Level II and Misty is retired from APDT rally, so we need another title to get started with CRO pivots. (What an excuse!)
Jude
11. Footwork Detail
probably to distinguish them from turns. In a pivot, there is no
forward, backward, or lateral motion by the handler: the handler turns
in place. (In a turn, or a circle, or a 270 right/left, the handler is
moving forward.)
FWIW, CRO is influenced by freestyle, and that's one reason I find it
fun and challenging, but it's still Rally, and Rally (like other kinds
of obedience) is essentially about precision. It's not hard to Q with a
less-than-graceful run, and it's not hard to NQ with a perfectly
graceful one -- miss or botch a sign and it doesn't matter how graceful
you are.
Susanna
fun and challenging, but it's still Rally, and Rally (like other kinds
of obedience) is essentially about precision. It's not hard to Q with a
less-than-graceful run, and it's not hard to NQ with a perfectly
graceful one -- miss or botch a sign and it doesn't matter how graceful
you are.
Susanna
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