# Agility first or obedience?



## thekarens (Apr 16, 2017)

If you had the long term goal to do both which would you start with? Agility or obedience?


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## lily cd re (Jul 23, 2012)

Obedience for sure! I have done both with Lily and feel my agility work improved with better obedience. Since mostly obedience is at close range you can really connect and learn to read each other and then the agility will fall into place as a way to stretch the distance and speed of your communication.

That doesn't mean you can't or shouldn't train for both at the same time though.


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## spindledreams (Aug 7, 2012)

Thanks thekarens for asking this question. I have a young dog I have been trying to make this exact same choice in classes for. Sounds like obedience and a closer connection will help later with his agility.


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## lily cd re (Jul 23, 2012)

spindledreams, Lily has become a much more attentive and hard working agility dog as a result of spending time with a private trainer for obedience. The person I work with for agility sees it too.


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## Skylar (Jul 29, 2016)

You can do both at the same time if you want. One club where I train for obedience recommends starting with obedience first - as Catherine pointed out you'll work on focus and being a team.

In my agility class they allow puppies. First the teacher immediately recognized that my dog had obedience training because of how close my dog sticks to me and moves with me and follows my directions - because of that training.

Puppies can do agility but there are a lot of constraints on what they physically can do both in class and training outside the class. Where I train for agility, until a dog is fully grown they do not allow the dog to repetitive jump through the jumps - instead they walk through the jump. They are allowed to walk through a pair of weave poles but they can not proceed to more, nor are they allowed to do the serpentine waving motions that dogs learn to do with the set of weave poles as they start to run through the weaves. They are not allowed to jump up onto the pause tables but must be picked up and placed. These are just a few examples. IOW, actions they may do running around and playing at home are fine but repetitive movement of the same kind is class is not allowed. 

There are some behaviors that are needed for both obedience and agility such as focus and sit-stay etc. that I felt were better taught at obedience. Sit-stay is important for competition in obedience where as in agility it's what your dog does until you start the course - same behavior but different emphasis. In agility I felt we were left on our own to figure it out (not a problem for my dog who can do it) but for the other dogs in the class who didn't have obedience training they may have needed some help. Yes they could ask the teacher and she was very generous in helping, but it was mostly left to you go home and do it because the class was focused on introducing the dog to the equipment and some basic footwork for the human.


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## Countryboy (May 16, 2011)

It's a no-brainer. First an Obedient dog... then further training.


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## Verve (Oct 31, 2016)

Obedience. I love it for itself, and it is the foundation for so many other sports. The ONE caveat is that advanced Obedience AND many other sports involve your dog working away from you in some way, e.g., Go Outs, agility obstacles, marks and blinds. Most if not all advanced Obedience trainers start working their own puppies in these skills early (e.g., teaching them to "mark" and go to a target). But the basic puppy/beginner classes I have attended focus on the Novice exercises, and don't teach those skills. I suggest you work on them yourself at home. Here is one trainer with lots of videos on youtube where she is teaching her puppy to mark. This puppy went on to get her UD (at least) and earn HIT.


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## thekarens (Apr 16, 2017)

Verve said:


> Obedience. I love it for itself, and it is the foundation for so many other sports. The ONE caveat is that advanced Obedience AND many other sports involve your dog working away from you in some way, e.g., Go Outs, agility obstacles, marks and blinds. Most if not all advanced Obedience trainers start working their own puppies in these skills early (e.g., teaching them to "mark" and go to a target). But the basic puppy/beginner classes I have attended focus on the Novice exercises, and don't teach those skills. I suggest you work on them yourself at home. Here is one trainer with lots of videos on youtube where she is teaching her puppy to mark. This puppy went on to get her UD (at least) and earn HIT.
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqOcJqBYG70




Thanks for the link!


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## lily cd re (Jul 23, 2012)

Verve I agree I love obedience for its own sake and would happily do just obedience, but I recognize that my poodles do love jumps and obstacles too so we muddle along in agility (I muddle, they fly). You are right about teaching go outs and such early. I learned the hard way with Lily (my A dog) that you can't wait until you have an open title or even just legs to start teaching utility. Javelin has kick ass go outs already and no title other than a rally novice. He will know all of obedience before he goes in for his novice title.


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## poshandpoodles (Mar 22, 2017)

My trainer recommended Obedience first when I asked her the same question. Her reasoning is that it provides a solid background for your dog. She said obedience first will help solidify your dog's recall and discipline so that your dog doesn't get overly excited by agility and start running all over the place. 
Moses and I are starting with Rally first. We're in our second sign class and will start practicing courses the beginning of June. We'll start up the 28 week obedience class when the next one starts. Once I get the okay from an instructor and feel confident in Moses we'll train for agility.


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## snow0160 (Sep 20, 2016)

We did basic obedience and the CGC first. We didn't do agility but started agility exercises. He is scared of a lot of agility equipment like the wobbling/stability boards or going up any beams. I think an agility class would help tremendously with confidence and I do wish I started that a little earlier.


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## Quossum (Mar 18, 2011)

I would say to start with a lot of the "foundation behaviors" that are common to both sports, such as self-control, body awareness, confidence, control positions (positions from which the dog does not move without an additional command, such as Sit or Down), focus forward (very important for Agility), tugging, ability to work away from the handler. 

There's a book called The FOCUSED Puppy that emphasizes little routines and activities to do with a puppy who is destined to be a performance dog. You might enjoy it! Control Unleashed: The Puppy Program is a similar book.

Good luck!

--Q


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## lily cd re (Jul 23, 2012)

Q those books are both great and for sure those foundational behaviors work for any sport a person wants to do with a dog. I still think for myself showing in obedience then agility is my general strategy, but agree that training for both is entirely possible.


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## poolann (Jan 31, 2013)

Quossum said:


> I would say to start with a lot of the "foundation behaviors" that are common to both sports, such as self-control, body awareness, confidence, control positions (positions from which the dog does not move without an additional command, such as Sit or Down), focus forward (very important for Agility), tugging, ability to work away from the handler. There's a book called The FOCUSED Puppy that emphasizes little routines and activities to do with a puppy who is destined to be a performance dog. You might enjoy it! Control Unleashed: The Puppy Program is a similar book.
> 
> Good luck!
> 
> --Q



This right here! Basic obedience & I mean thoroughly proofed basic obedience! However, having trained different breeds in both for 9+ years I do have some observations......dogs that do high level competitve obedience & are trained in such a way that they aren't allowed to think for themselves do run into issues. They tend to have trouble working off the right side. Keep in mind, competition obedience works entirely on the left. Also imo agility requires a dog to sometimes make decisions quickly, the wrong type of obedience training (harsh correction based) can result in a dog that waits to be told what to do rather than choosing an option. Think of it as needing a dog who will make a decision when you realize you've made a mistake & they bail you out.

Personally I recommend training both. Racer started his first class at around 12 weeks. It was a trick class geared towards agility. Lots of focus on body awareness & staying engaged. At 18 weeks he went on to puppy agility & at 20 weeks competition obedience & rally. Before I taught all the obedience classes & for a brief period 2 years ago he took classes in both venues. He's really great in obedience & rally when I keep up that training but for the last year agility has been the focus as that is where I prefer to compete.


--Q[/QUOTE]


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## lily cd re (Jul 23, 2012)

poolann while I agree with you to some extent I think that really good training for the utility exercises in obedience is a process that encourages good decision making and willingness to work away and independently.


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