SH101: Introduction to IPO Tracking
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Course Details
This course introduces the team (handler and dog) to the basics of footstep tracking. "Footstep tracking" refers to the style of tracking where the dog must show where each and every footstep of the tracklayer fell, leading to the highest possible scores in the sport of IPO. In addition to "footstep" tracking, IPO dogs are required to track with a "deep nose". This means that the dog's nose is deep into the terrain, and the dog's body language shows intensity and concentration throughout the track.
Shade will explain how to imprint these behaviors early in foundation work by teaching scent boxes and circle tracks associated with lots of treats, while allowing the dog to work the “track” without interference from the handler, which can cause many of the problems seen in trial. The class will then move on to serpentines and straight legs with turns. Finally, Shade will discuss how to start fading the food off the track near the end of this course.
Shade will also cover how to teach a proper article indication, and games to establish hunt drive as a prerequisite to adding them to the track. After all, tracking is eventually about finding the dropped articles, not the treats!
Line handling as a management tool without correction is also integral to helping the dog learn to track properly, and Shade will cover this as well.
And finally, the class will consider the rules and what a handler should expect in the IPO 1 tracking phase.
While your dog will not become a fluent tracker in six weeks, you will be introduced to the skills you need to progress towards your IPO tracking title. Follow up tracking courses in this series will add progressively greater challenges as well as introducing the expectations of longer and more difficult IPO tracks.
This method works extremely well! Shade has earned scores of 99, 100 and 100 in IPO tracking - all on different dogs!
Check out this short class trailer!:
Syllabus
week 1: Scent boxes/Lured start and finish/Loose leash walking
week 2: Article game/Starts/Eye contact
week 3: Circle tracks/conditions/Line Handling
week 4: Serpentines/Down stays/Marking Tracks
week 5: Serpentines to straights and 90 % turns/Article game on grass
week 6: Skipping food
Prerequisites & Supplies
Prerequisites: none required. It is helpful to have a knowledge of shaping and a marker system in place. It is also helpful to have a quick down and a down stay started so that you are not training this piece when it comes to article indications.
Equipment: long line (at least 15 feet and light), collar, yummy treats and enough land to lay a 100 pace track by the end of the course. Flags (hardware store), and articles, which can be anything when you start. Gloves, glove fingers, leather wallets, carpet pieces. Regulation IPO articles are approximately 1 inch by 4 inches, material is carpet, leather and wood.
Time commitment: Gold spot students should plan to track several times a week but video taping is required much less often. Minimal land is needed in the first three weeks, but towards the end of the 6 weeks, dogs can be tracking up to 75-100 paces (if their persistence and concentration is developed enough). Dogs with very high food drive will do best at this method of IPO tracking. While dogs without food drive can certainly learn how to track footstep to footstep with R+ training, this course does not cover those specialized cases.
Instructor
Shade Whitesel
Faculty
Shade Whitesel (she/her) has been training and competing in dog sports since she was a kid. Always interested in how dogs learn, she has successfully competed in IPO/schutzhund, AKC obedience and French Ring. Her retired dog, Reiki vom Aegis, IPO 3, FH 1, French Ring 1, CDX, was 5th at the...