Scenarios ????????????? upper levels??????

[zjhog]

I was talking last night and the other day, one person a psa member and the other person a schutzhund judge...Yes the old schutzhund people ..
We were talking about the the upper level scenarios..Such as if one judge for protection say to down your dog and when the decoy moves the dog may bite...and the next day a different judge sets up the same thing, but the dog must remain down????Yes we can train it...by teaching our dogs commands to bite and not bite...
Our conversations then went like this...why not have 50 or 25 set level 3 Scenarios and on trial day then draw from a hat on trail day then you can pass that scenario to the spectators ,so as Rick F once said.." so the upper levels don't look like a total cluster F to the spectators"...I am in Know way trying to water down PSA..I will always try to make it better..Evan if you did this I am 100% sure that any police force in the world would not have dog as well trained as ours and our dogs will be strong because we have trained our dogs clearly..not confuse them....Yes we must train for everything ,but I do believe that this will step up our training as a whole and Increase demand for our sport as well as our dogs...
Boy for such a moron ..This idea sounds good to me..
I hope all will give input,,Registered forum users,PSA members,administrator,and especially the PSA directors,,Just want to hear reasoning why or why not this is a valid idea...

[Stellen]

Out of the 99.9% of the times that you suffer from diarrhea of the mouth when you open it Hill, this is the .1% that I will cosign that this sounds like a good idea . Although 50!!!!!!!!!!! scenarios I believe the dogs will be 14 yo when they get shown in the 3's . The scenarios should probably be drawn by the judge who is presiding over the trial in advanced so that the audience has a printed program or sheet of what they are going to see or should be seeing. Better yet,it can be posted on the forum the morning of the trial,so the audience can go right to their phones on the sidelines and look it up (saves paper for my tree hugging people out there ) people at home across the country can keep up with the trial and the pics that get posted later. I cant follow the pics very well myself . As a handler you still cant train for it, it just allows you maybe a few more hours to formulate a strategy and calm your nerves to handle yourself and the dog, so in theory you should show better! Not bad Hill but your still an F'N Moron, yet you make a valid point...it may very well draw more people into PSA! Just my wooden nickel...but I'd like to hear what others think about this one also!

[Rick Furrow]

Well.......
This exact idea has been kicked around the directors meeting for the past three or so years. I cringed when I read the post because usually the vote ends up somewhere around split on the topic. I dont keep secrets and put it out there just as it happens no punches so here are the usual concerns. The level three has pretty much been untouched and unchanged since the beginning. Last year I proposed having two set scenarios and two complete suprise. My thinking was in the one its a known suprise the two its three set one suprise so the level three if following progression would be two and two. That makes it much more known and trainable and is somewhat easier. Still difficult but undeniably easier. The level three as it stands requires a very imaginative trainer and a very controlled dog because there is no pattern. I think twenty five or fifty set scenarios will in a way make the level three more difficult than the way it is now as complely suprise. If you set that many scenarios without a doubt there will be many more skills than what is needed at this point. There will for sure be formal object guards, search/bark and holds, multiple call offs, and many other skills. I hate to really state this but realistically there arent that many skills required for a level three at this time. The trend seems to be remote escorts, send to guard, rebiting excersises, multiple escorts, call off, courage tests, enviormental distractions, and control excersises. Im not saying its easy because the suprise element combined with the order of the skills makes the sport difficult. I guess the best way to explain myself is the way it stands now the level three is different variations of the same skills. Its aceptable within the rules to do formal object guards and the other skills I listed however most if not all judges are aware that the sport is difficult enough without adding too many new "skills". Another concern is the sport is designed with the intention of being able to handle your dog and make decsions. A set scenario calls and would demand the scenario completed in a certain fashion without giving the handler an option to think and handle their way through the scenario. I think of it like this if the scenario is known and th handler knows what to expect than as a judge I would expect the scenario to be done by the book without variation. I can also judge precision because the handler and I know what to expect. This being said I'll give my personal opinion in the next paragraph.

One part of me would hate to change the level three because on piece of me thinks it would be disrespectful to the dogs that have obtained their level three. The other part of me would like to see it changed in some way because I feel its a discrace to only have five dogs obtaining the highest level in our sport. Its well below an average of one a year. I believe there have been quite a few dogs in our sport that were quality enough of a dog with good enough training to deserve a level three. Of the five dogs that obtained the level three four of the dogs only passed the minimum requirement of two legs and most were well past their prime when they obtained it. I think as a organization the changes made last year made the sport much better and closer to the vision of what PSA was originally intended to be. Just some history ...Jerry Bradshaw wrote the entire sport from scratch. Several individuals took credit but he wrote it. Joe Morris was a very good promoter and he promoted the hell out of it but took little part in the actual design and creation. OJ Knigten was added as West Coast and was also a great promoter and pushed the sport to incredible growth on the West. Jerry had the original vision of what PSA was to be and intended the rulebook to reflect his vision. That didn't work out and the sport took on many different faces because many of the first judges had their own personal ideas and agendas for the sport. I remember certain judges having competitions to see how many dogs they could fail driving the difficulty through the roof. This made the sport in my mind way to inconsistent. High failure rates were a product of personal disputes and agendas. Power struggles were poisonous to bringing the sport back to what it was intended to be. It seemed that the heads of the sport couldn't come together and were unable to make decisions because everyone wanted to be in charge. The directors became title hungry and everyone was more concerned about being in charge than righting the sport. There was just too much personal ill feelings between people to make the sport run smoothly. Jerry ended up walking away from the sport because at that time nothing good could come of the sport, Joe ended up leaving the sport due to personal issues which left OJ's in charge. OJ brought in Darryl in the midwest and myself on the East. Still no beneficial rule changes to the sport. It was basically limping along because still as directors everyone was insuffiient at making decisions. Jerry came back and I happily gave him the East Coast throne. Two more years of bickering and fighting to where I attempted to step away from my Assistant Director position. Somehow I resign and get trapped into a Director role by Jerry and Darryl. OJ walked away from the sport leaving Jerry as President, Darryl and I as Directors. Lucilano was willing to step up as Director of the West and had the trust of all three of us. Add several very competent Assistants and here we are. Last year was the only directors meeting ive been involved in that had any type of success. I think the changes made last year made the sport fair and more steamlined. The sport finally has came back to close to what the original vision of the sport was. Jerry is the only one who knows what he originally invisioned but I think we are close.

All that typing to say .....We were a completely dysfuncional bullshit board of directors up until last year. Thats my opinion of course. I believe that the decline of PSA participation through 2004 until last year was completely the board of directors fault. If the heads of the organization and judges would have put differences aside and didnt let the sport get out of control with difficulty there would be more competitors than time would allow. A time ago there were trials with sixty dogs. We are finally starting to see a growth this year now that the sport has returned to a passing level. Many competitors walked away years ago and I dont blame them. Of course almost everyone is welcome back. Theres all the dark and dirty right out there in black and white. I believe in honesty and maintaining integrity. Im not afraid to admit when I screw up. Sorry for the novel but I assure everyone that we are in a much better place. I believe without a solid board of directors any organization flounders. It either has to be a solid group that respects one another or get rid of the group and one person in charge. The board of directors are unified and on the same page now. We trust each other and that enables us to make decisions for the benefit of the sport. We realy looked at the PDC, 1, and two last year. Those levels were revamped I feel for the better and I dont see any changes coming to them. Again this depends on the other directors as well but I think those levels are right where they need to be. Maybe the three needs to be looked at but those changes come tough. Its the top of the game, cream of the crop so we will all be very cautious to make changes. We were unable to come to agreement on any changes last year mainly because we were all torn. I dont have an exact answer mainly because I dont know where I stand on the idea.

[Stellen]

Well, Rick F, I salute you for your candor....I do remember monster trials years ago like Donovans (concert/ dog trial/fireworks/buffet, etc, etc.) . I knew some BS was going on a few years back, but like maybe most of those that can remember didn't know what it was exactly. Thanks for laying things out there...now some of the things that went on makes sense! It also makes sense why the upper levels remain untouched, with rehearsed or predetermined scenarios comes the ability to completely crucify the teams precision . No need to make it harder than it already is. Thanks Rick for the clarity!

[laurelstone]

Thanks for the update Rick! I ditto Stellen. Those fireworks sure were good however! ... and the buffet! Glad things are looking up!

[Khoi Pham]

Hey thanks for the novel Rick, (-: I came to the game late but like it very much and don't care what happen in the past just the present and future, so I hope you guys can keep it up and make PSA grows. I do like the idea of announcing the scenario for the upper level to the spectators so they know what is expect of the team, because sometime I watch the video of the upper level and have no idea of what are they supposed to do, imagine someone new or coming from another sport, they will not appreciate the difficulty of the exercise at all and will not create interest in the sport.

[mari]

Rick,

Thanks for the detailed explanation and PSA history. One question concerning PSA's inception. Someone on another forum suggested that PSA was derived or stemmed from K9 Pro Sports. I spoke to Jerry some years ago about his background and PSA in general and do not recall him ever state that he was involved in K9 Pro Sports. Can you elaborate on PSA's relationship to K9 Pro Sports if any? Did the conception of PSA or any scenarios come from K9 Pro Sport?

Thanks

[Rick Furrow]

Well I wont deny that Jerry, Joe and their club members including me all competed in K9 Prosports very briefly before PSA was created. Jerry and Joe also competed in NAPD. Jerry competed in Schutzhund also. My only point is that PSA isnt a offspin of any one sport in particular. It has no links to K9 Prosports other than it was created because Prosports wasnt being run fairly. There was some clear integrity issues associated with K9 Prosports. When I competed in Prosports there were very strong competitors with very powerful dogs. Inevitably a weaker poor quality dog would beat the stronger better trained dogs. We all stopped competing for about a year or so then Jerry and Joe did a couple suprise scenario trials. These trials were actually the predecessor to PSA. There were four or so of these suprise scenario trials then Jerry wrote a rulebook standardizing the trials and calling it PSA. The sport has evolved over the years into the sport we have now. We are in no way a spin off of K9 Prosports. No scenarios are designed or even resemble anything in K9 Prosports. If anything we are Schutzhund meets KNPV meets Ringsport. I have nothing bad or good to say about the organization at this point. I dont compete in the sport and probably never will. The people in charge of that sport have a lot of negative things to say about PSA however they have never competed in PSA. Funny thing is they believe we actually are in some sort of competition with them and thats the reason PSA is continually brought up by them. I tell everyone "If you like Schutzhund do Schutzhund, if you like ring do ring, If you like Prosports do Prosports." I encourage crossover if the person is interested but its PSA and not schutzhund ring or prosports. I believe everyone should do what makes the happy and what fits their skill set. PSA is a challenge and if someone wants the challenge I welcome them openly.

[Don Tapp]

I believe everyone should do what makes the happy and what fits their skill set. PSA is a challenge and if someone wants the challenge I welcome them openly.

Well put Rick. Hope you guys are doing well.

[mari]

Thanks Rick! I appreciate you candor. PSA is definitely in a class all by itself. I compete in Schutzhund now and I definately want to cross my dog over to PSA after we finish his titles.