Pulling back vs. torquing the sleeve.

[Castlemaid]

I didn't want to hijack another thread where this came up, but would love to have some input on people's views on a dog pulling back (humping back) the sleeve, and vs. torquing the sleeve. I'm not talking about shaking the sleeve when dog is in prey drive, though from some training videos I have seen, sometimes the shaking or torquing can be close and difficult to differentiate (for me, anyways).

So! I've always been told that pulling back (humping), shows power, confidence, clear-headedness. It shows that the dog feels confident about being able to deal with the threat at hand, and is not intimidated or trying to avoid the head-on, frontal presence of the decoy, while torquing can be seen as the dog trying to avoid the front of the decoy and finding a safer place to the side. At the same time, I see RCMP dogs doing hidden-sleeve work, and torquing is encouraged as it will disable and bring down a perp quicker than the pulling back. (We had a guest trainer doing a seminar once, and he found the 'humping back' term offensive, and insisted that we say 'pulling back').

I'd love to have a discussion on what humping back and/or torquing shows in the dog, and why humping back seems to be preferred (or I get the feeling from the trainers that I have worked with that humping back is preferred.) Not clear myself if humping back is preferred for training purposes, or for the maximum points in trial purposes.

[gagsd]

Do you mean torquing, or pulling the sleeve behind the helper?

[FG167]

I know of some training helpers that like to have the dog torque to the side (they stick the dog to get there and then they slip the sleeve when there is strong fight to the side). The opinion is that the dog is difficult to lock-up with, prolonging the fight with the helper and therefore looking more powerful.

The problem then lies that if the helper cannot adequately lock up, as in the front, the dog has a problem to out. I am a novice handler but I have seen this replicated in 6 or 8 dogs - same training styles and the dogs show loads of fight, are difficult to get in front, difficult to lock up and either refuse to out or are slow. Yeah, it looks impressive and the dogs look powerful - but for sport/points, it is a disaster. With a really large dog you could potentially have some troubles stopping the fight at all I suppose. Since I am in it for sport, I would prefer my dog hump/pull/fight backwards but in front of the helper.

Now for "real life" situations, I would think that the side torque-ing would cause a serious hurting.

[Castlemaid]

Originally Posted by gagsd

Do you mean torquing, or pulling the sleeve behind the helper?

I mean torquing - pulling the sleeve behind the helper to me is avoidance. When some dogs torque the sleeve, they do often move over to the side away from the center position, but are still in front of the helper.

(This is where things get tricky - everyone has a different picture in mind for the same term).

[gagsd]

My dog "torques".... and "humps." Couldn't resist

But by torqueing, I mean that he hits the sleeve very hard and very fast, and immediately twists, with his whole body, As if trying to remove the helper's arm. I get a little picture of what it feels like playing tug with him and I worry about my helper's health.
I remember one time several months ago that he was getting a lot of "heat" from the helper, and he pulled the sleeve around behind the helper. I saw it as a way to get out of a stressful situation.

[lhczth]

Pulling behind and what I mean by torquing or hitting back are not the same thing. I have trained with the same people Falon is talking about and I understand the principle of why they teach what they do. It can create some very strong dogs on the escape bite and dogs that are difficult to drive and to lock up, but it can also create other issues as she mentions and is teaching the dog to remove itself from the fight. There was a dog about 10 years ago that I remember people oooing and ahhing over because he looked so strong during the drives. I knew this dog. He was stick shy. They had taught him to pull back behind the helper during the drives which made him very hard to drive and also to apply the stick hits.

The humping/pulling away from the helper is also a way of teaching the dog to avoid the pressure. The dog may be in front, but he is still attempting to pull himself away from the pressure of a direct fight with the helper (and, of course, I am generalizing since not ALL dogs are doing this for those reasons). There are dogs that slam into the sleeve and then pull back with much power, but you can see they are doing this not because they are so strong, but because they do not want to be that close to the helper.

A dog that is torquing the sleeve and hitting back is not in avoidance and not trying to avoid pressure. He is attempting to control and overpower the helper. These dogs generally stay in front and fight. The best example I can think of to show is Arek Stoffelblick. At the end of the routine when the helper has locked up the last time after the courage test (this is the old SchH test) shows his fight the best.

Go to http://www.vombanholz.be/ Click on Movie Archives then on Hall of Fame then scroll down to Arek Stoffelblick (there are a lot of great videos on this site). The video quality isn't very good, but you can get the idea.

[gagsd]

Lisa, that was your 11,000th post!!!!

[lhczth]

I have been a member for a very long time and sometimes I do actually get chatty.

[Castlemaid]

Wow on that video! Now there's a dog that exudes power in every move and every bark! Thank you so much for that example, it really helped to see what you mean by torquing - I was thinking more in terms of trashing whenever I saw that term. You can see that the dog is bringing the power and the fight to the sleeve, to the helper, not trying to get the sleeve away from the helper, and never tries to move away from the frontal position.

I'm still curious to know or hear opinions as to where the preference for humping back came from.

[crackem]

I don't think it tells much of anything by itself.