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Fostering Excellence in Agility — Kids & Family
Fostering Excellence in Agility

Megan Foster, Founder of Synergy Dog Sports and creator of Fostering Excellence in Agility, shares her passion, knowledge, tips and secrets for all things dog agility. Each episode, she will take you through a critical element of agility training and break down the history of it, the dos and don’ts, as well as some key action steps you can take today to continue your path to excellence. Discover how to approach agility training from a place of wellness and learn how to build an agility training program that fits your needs and fuels your passion for the sport. Megan has taken her experience over the last 25 years and developed a systematic approach to agility that applies the most innovative positive reinforcement techniques to both ends of the leash. Megan not only coaches students on their training and competitive goals but also mentors other dog agility coaches to hone their craft in the dog sport world. Ready to ignite (or re-ignite) your passion for this game? Hit subscribe & let’s go!

Latest Episodes:

Leaving the Ring Early Jan 14, 2025

Show notes

037 When does Megan think about leaving the ring early and what does that look like? Listen to episode 37 to find out!

What Does Proofing Look Like? Jan 07, 2025

Show notes

036 Megan explains how she proofs different behaviors to aim for her ultimate goal: ring sustainability.

Addressing Bar-Knocking Behavior Mar 22, 2024

Show notes

035 Megan unpacks her thoughts about bar-knocking in this requested episode.

Megan's favorite jumping experts:
Linda Mecklenburg https://awesomepawsagilityacademy.com/current-classes/
Dr. Leslie Eide https://www.thetotalcanine.com/online-learning.html

Join the coaching program https://fxagility.mykajabi.com/fx-agility-waitlist

Sarah Stremming's Webinar, Bravery School https://sarahstremming.com/products/webinar/bravery-school/

Teeter training program https://fxagility.mykajabi.com/offers/sUU48VFG/checkout

Adjusting Criteria in Training Feb 22, 2024

Show notes

034 Should you make something easier in training or try to pivot in another way? Find out what Megan thinks in this episode!

Recapping Sprint's Agility Debut Aug 10, 2023

Show notes

033 Megan shares her experience debuting Sprint, her two-year-old Border Collie, in agility competitions. Find out insights into what Megan saw change in Sprint's behavior over time and how well the debut strategy worked.

Resources:
Episode 32: Are You Ready to Compete?

Youtube: Sprint's First Trial Highlights

Youtube: Sprint's Second Trial, Novice Jumping

Youtube: Second Trial, Novice Agility

Episode 28: How Outside the Ring Behaviors Impact Inside the Ring Behaviors

Episode 31: Using FEO and Fix & Go Effectively

Are You Ready to Compete? Jul 20, 2023

Show notes

032 When should you start competing and what does that look like for each team? How to plan to maximize success all comes down to the splits in behavior that we need our dogs to understand.

Using FEO and FnG Effectively Jun 08, 2023

Show notes

031 For Exhibition Only and Fix and Go On are two tools we have in the competition ring that can help us narrow the gap between how our dogs perform in training versus how they perform in trials. In this episode, Megan breaks down the pros and cons of each and talks about how she would use either of these options.
Mentioned in this episode:
Using FEO/NFC with a toy in the ring: https://youtu.be/C6z7UqyPzDo
Proactively helping a dog before they make a mistake: https://youtu.be/xq4oobNp2wo

The Pitfalls of Cue Escalation --> https://fxagility.com/blog/the-pitfalls-of-cue-escalation/

Different Types of Training --> https://fxagility.com/blog/reducing-delaying-reinforcement/

Beginning of Run Routines --> https://fxagility.com/blog/beginning-of-run-routines-evaluating-your-dogs-readiness/

End of Run Routines --> https://fxagility.com/blog/end-of-run-routines-do-you-have-it-do-you-need-it/

Episode 29, Startlines with Sarah Espinoza-Sokal --> https://fxagility.mykajabi.com/podcasts/fostering-excellence-in-agility/episodes/2147886802

Agility Course Analysis Jun 01, 2023

Show notes

030 Megan talks about learning the course from the dog's perspective, the importance of sticking to the plan, the five phases of course analysis, and course memorization tips.

Join Megan on June 1st at 6pm PT for her FDSA Webinar, Agility Course Analysis

Repairing Startline Behaviors with Sarah Espinoza-Sokal Mar 02, 2023

Show notes

029 Megan interviews Sarah Espinoza-Sokal about her experience repairing her Kelpie, Zi's startline performance. Megan and Sarah unpack the unique pieces of the training puzzle and discuss why each piece was important and how Sarah was able to implement it in training and in competition.

You can follow Sarah on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/agilityodyssey

Sarah invested most of her first 30 years into a passion for horses. In 2016, she decided to rehome her last horse and devote herself to agility instead. She quickly fell in love with international-style agility, and set her sights on one day competing in Europe.

Sarah’s first agility dog suffered a career-ending injury in 2017, retiring before he earned Novice titles. She started over with agility dog 1.5 — a Working Kelpie puppy named Zi — in September 2017.

Sarah and Zi competed in their first national competition at Cynosport in 2021. In 2022, they were fortunate enough to run at World Team Tryouts, the West Coast Open, the US Open, and European Open Team Tryouts, vastly expanding their skills as a team.

A lifelong writer and obsessive nerd, Sarah shares her story of pursuing excellence in agility on her Agility Odyssey Facebook page, where she loves to discuss both the smallest of training details and the largest of life lessons.

How Outside the Ring Behaviors Impacts Inside the Ring Behaviors Feb 16, 2023

Show notes

028 Optimal level of arousal is necessary for optimal performance. Does your dog's arousal increase in the parking lot of the agility trial or is it later in the run, like at obstacle 15? Let's take a look at how your beginning of the run AND end of the run routines are impacting your dog's performance. In this episode, Megan mentions several other resources, including:
Episode 27 How Trialing Informs Your Training

Cog Dog Radio, Reinforcement Misunderstandings

Training on Their Timeline with Sarah Stremming

Check back next week for an interview with Sarah Espinoza-Sokal to talk about the training that we did together in order to address Zi's startline in competition. Spoiler: the outside-the-ring behaviors were impacting the inside-the-ring behaviors!

That's all for this week! Follow on FB, IG, TikTok, and Youtube: @fxagility

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