Gladiator dog?

[M. Demetrius]

http://www.youtube . com/watch? v=crmD_B8ERzk

I know, it's not a serious gladiator thread attempt, but I thought it was really well done. Dog freestyle training has certain steps and routines, much like freestyle figure skating. I thought it was pretty great how the handler worked this out. Good dog. Good job, says I.

[Lucius Rabirius]

The link doesn´t work. This is the correct one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crmD_B8ERzk

And of course its not serious :lol: but so amazing and wonderful. I was really impressed by this video!

[M. Demetrius]

Thanks for the link repair. That's one well-trained dog, isn't it? Now if we could get the guy in a little better kit, we'd really have a show!

[ParthianBow]

Errm - would we?! I thought it was cringeworthy! As well as the awful kit, there weren't too many Border Collies in Rome :lol:

[M. Demetrius]

I don't know about the cringing. I do a little dog training. ( I have a little dog, heh, a Sheltie. ) And the degree of work needed to get to where the gladiator dog got is pretty phenomenal. Evidently, like figure skating, the dog/trainer teams have a certain number of "tricks" they have to do, but they can put them in various order, and add some of their own. If you watch many of those freestyles, you'll see repeats (figure 8 around the legs, jump over, roll over, stand on hind legs, etc).

The man is giving signals with the sword, his free hand and with his body position. I thought it was pretty impressive. It shows countless hours of practice, and real trust between dog and man.