DS110 Dryland Dock Diving Training- Foundation, Fitness and Fixes!

Are you interested in dock diving and want to give your dog a great foundation before you even hit the pool? Or perhaps you’ve been to the pool with your dog and things didn’t go as well as you expected. OR maybe you are already hooked on the sport and want to make some progress during the offseason or up your dog’s game between pool rentals? Whatever your situation, this course is here to help you and your dog find joy and success in dock diving by focusing on the groundwork fundamentals.

Course Details

Dock diving as a sport is very beginner friendly and a popular way for dogs to have fun and enjoy summer. It’s also a sport that offers a LOT of room for advanced training that can help your dog’s jumps improve, build their confidence overall, and allow you to really feel the teamwork involved with perfect timing and precision!

Most dogs will have the best chance at having a good first impression of dock diving, enjoying this sport long term, and jumping to their full potential if they have a proper foundation of skills to set them up and if their bodies are conditioned to handle it. This course will look at each of the main ’events’ that are most common in the various dock diving competition leagues- distance, speed type events, and the suspended toy games- and will break each of these down into their component parts, and then develop those individual skills in progression on dryland. We’ll also cover fitness and conditioning exercises that can help improve your dog’s strength, balance and stamina for safer, bigger jumps. And, we’ll look at some of the common dock diving training problems that come up and how these foundation games and exercises can improve those!

Additionally, we’ll look at how each of these individual foundation games fits into actual dock diving, what we expect it to do for your dog’s game, and how they can be used or adapted during your pool time to help transfer your dryland skills to the dock.

Gold students will be able to do the majority of the exercises in a small space, indoors, with a no-slip flooring surface. If you have access to more space we can make use of it and students who have access to a pool may choose to post their dog’s past or current dock diving videos for feedback or analysis as they fit into the weekly material. However, the course is intended to be a dryland training course, so no current or previous pool access is necessary to complete it and you’ll find that there is very little that can’t be done in the average sized living room or smaller backyard. There will be some bending, tugging and play required as homework in several lessons.

Teaching Approach

Each week will contain several subtopics with lectures containing written descriptions of each exercise and brief video examples. Many of the video examples will show both a dog in the learning stages as well as a more advanced dog in order that students can see how skills progress. Some lectures will also include analysis of actual dock diving in order jumps to better show how foundation skills fit in. Some lectures are more conceptual in nature but most will contain short homework assignments. Homework for each week is progressive. Some bonus reference lectures are included to help students transfer dryland skills to the dock when weather/access permits and will not require homework.

Feedback for gold and silver students is detailed and encouraging- typically, the feedback is provided in written form but occasionally screenshots with markups or video demos are provided in order to help clarify next steps. You will receive feedback on what is going RIGHT as well as what needs changing.

This class will have a Teaching Assistant (TA) available in the Facebook study group to help the Bronze and Silver students! Directions for joining can be found in the classsroom after you register.

Syllabus

Pre Class Lecture- Building Props!

Week 1- Foundation Skills

Safety in Dryland Training
Essential Toy Skills Games for Dock Diving
Fitness Beginnings
Cookie Fetch Game

Week 2- Confidence, Coordination and Cooperation

Mini Grabs
Surface Changes
Accepting Restraint and Bracing
Weight Shifting
Rear End Awareness

Week 3- Speed Event Skills

Quick Crisp Turns
Grabbing Off the Rig
Take Off Striding
Rapid Returns
Rear End Exercises

Week 4 Distance Event Skills

The Anatomy of a Safe and Effective Jump
Tracking vs Catching
Training or Retraining Stays
Stays with Higher Arousal
Balance
Mini Grabs Meet Surface Changes
Bonus: Throwing Part 1

Week 5- Suspended Toy Games

Look up! Game and Plan B
Hop Up Game
Striding, Extension and Collection
Flexibility
Bonus: Throwing Part 2

Week 6- Progressing and Problem Solving

Fast Fetch Training Game
Stamina Building
Foundations, fluctuations and Fixes – Which dryland game and when?
Bonus: Throwing Part 3

Prerequisites & Supplies

Pre-requisite skills- A dog who is interested in retrieving toys is highly recommended. Lessons can be adapted for dogs of all ages but for youngsters you'll have the most success if they already understand working for reinforcement.

Supplies & Equipment-

A platform- stable, and long enough for your dog to fully sit on. Something like a Cato board works great but anything of similar shape and sturdiness works. (Foam exercise mats cut, stacked and taped are a super option.)
Stable, grippy front foot target, about the same height as your dog's wrist ie- rubber food bowl turned upside down, small stool, phonebook with a piece of yoga mat taped on.
Two IDENTICAL toys that your dog is enthusiastic about, can retrieve and tug. Use what your dog already likes! If they are not fussy or you are not sure, a foam Dokken Double Roper Super Dummy is appealing to many dogs. Puppies often really like fuzzy tugs that have a long handle!
A couple pieces of sturdy string (paracord type style) - about 3 feet worth total
Pair of Clothespins or similar style clips, which have a hole or option for attaching your strings
Broomstick or similar dowel-shaped object
Traffic cone or plunger

Sample Lecture

WEIGHT SHIFTING

The last piece to this puzzle is training a weight shift. We want our dogs to have more weight coming from their rear when they first launch out of their startline position, whether they are being restrained or not. Dogs who are scrambling trying to run forward before they are released, or dogs who are hovering forward like a vulture, will not be able to take a consistent or powerful first stride. We want consistency! If it takes 7 strides for our dog to get from the back of the dock to the front, we want those to be the same sized stride on every turn. This is how we get the confidence for a dog to power off at the edge of the dog vs slipping and falling in, or taking off early because their striding is out of whack or they are worried about a slip. Get the rear-end powerhouse loaded right at the startline.

You've already got most of the pieces that we need for this behavior, now it's just time to notice and mark the weight shift. Most dogs will offer this in a standing position most easily, particularly when they are anticipating a release. First we'll take advantage of their anticipation to capture and reward the weight shift, and then we'll put it on cue.

So following all of the above that you've done with the middle, restraint and bracing, get yourself all set up and toss the cookie or toy out ahead as their visual target. Now just wait briefly. Watch for a sign that your dog is 'holding themself back'- this may come with a slight head raise or you might even feel them lean back a bit in anticipation of being released. This will always be more subtle if the dog is sitting, so you might be able to feel it more than see it. When you see that first clue, mark it with your release cue and let go.

Here is a dog who tends to do the leaning forward/vulture move. I don't release her if she's leaning forward or jerking back and forth. When I am holding her in the sit or down, I can feel her lean back just a touch and her head lifts up- this is when I release her. In the very last rep, where I am not holding her, she tends to want to lean forward again- I ask for a back up ("beep beep") and that slight scooch backwards is enough to shift her weight back so I can reward her with a release.

Build on this- as your dog starts to realize that their action of leaning away from the cookie or toy results in a release, they will start to offer more.

When you see that your dog is starting to get it, I add a weight shift cue word. Mine is a whispered 'readyyyyyy' followed by a much louder Get It as a release once they have weight-shifted. Once I start putting this on cue, I will no longer release the dog just for offering a weight shift - only when I specifically have asked for it. We don't want a whole bunch of weight shifting back and forth while they are waiting, or hovering in weight shift mode, as that can be super comfortable and removes some of the benefits of the momentum that you get from releasing the dog just as they offer a weight shift. I have my dog standing relaxed and focused until I cue readdyyy, and then it's a quick release once they have shifted their weight back. The release is quick after the weight shift to take advantage of the loading in the rear. We are not looking for them to weight shift and then pause before releasing. Load on cue and then go!

Here is a quick clip of Venom working on her weight shift on the dock. Initially, she offers a weight shift before I am ready and so she doesn't get released for that- I wait until I cue it. (Note that Venom is really well conditioned to handling and I can lift her around on the dock without worrying her- most dogs are going to do better if they get into their stand or sit position on their own. Another big note here: YOUR feet move into the bracing position after your dog has assumed a square stand. You do not move their feet to accommodate your stance for bracing.)

Instructors

Erin Lynes

Erin (she/her) is a lifelong dog enthusiast from Quesnel, British Columbia, Canada. Erin is certified as a Karen Pryor Academy Training Partner, a Certified Professional Canine Fitness Trainer, a Licensed Family Dog Mediator, and as a Cani-Fit Leader, ...

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