Jaakk-O Turn Task

Wow... it's been ages since I've made a blog post in here. I think I tend to write in bursts so, hopefully, this is the start of a blog post burst. :)

Yesterday, I pulled the Jaakko Turn task card from my agility grab bag. For those of you guys who aren't familiar with what a Jaakko turn is, it's a fairly new agility handling move from the One Mind Dog (OMD) crew. The Jaakko is sort of replacing the Ketschker as the go to move to cue a tight turn like you would need to wrap a jump. I am actually starting to seriously embrace the One Mind Dog handling system because Ocean really reads these cues that I've been using well. I decided to use part of a Masters USDAA course to practice our Jaakko turns. Coming from the landing side of jump #2 with Ocean wrapping #3 to the right (coming through 2 and 3) and heading to 4 was my handling game plan. The Jaakko cue would happen right in front of 3.

 

  

What exactly is a Jaakko turn? With the Jaakko, Ocean is on my left side heading to jump 3 and I start to position myself near the front of that jump and on the side that I want him to turn. My body is facing forward and I stoop down with that left arm across my body cueing him to take that jump. My body language should tell him this is strong deceleration and for him to chip in and turn tight to the side that I am standing (and to not take #2 again.) There's also a blind cross element to this turn! I intend to pick Ocean up again with my left hand as I move towards jump #4. So, as Ocean is in the air and wrapping the jump upright, he and I are more or less doing a blind cross. This is one of the few times you'll see me do something like a blind cross with him. LOL So, that's the Jaakko...and what separates that from the Ketschker is that you do stoop down low to cue that strong deceleration. The Ketschker, you stay more upright...and you don't get as hard as a deceleration cue.

Here's some video from yesterday...complete with weird music. ;) You'll see that our jump backsides still need some work. My instructor and I decided that I really should start handling backsides on the take off side because when I'm on the landing side, I can't get myself out of the way enough for me not to get hit by him. So....that take off backside handling is something new to our agility handling toolbox.

So you guys...'til next time! I have some rally tutorials I have to edit and I'm hoping to get those up relatively soon. :)