What obstacles are in a dog agility course?

The A-Frame, Dog Walk, See Saw and Table are known as contact obstacles. These require the dog to come in contact with the yellow painted area of the obstacles in order to score. There are several different types of jump and hurdles found in an agility course. Jumps and Hurdles are jumps with a solid wall as part of the jump which may be made of wood panels or blocks. A broad jump, or long jump, requires the dog to jump over a longer area with wooden slats underneath to denote the area to cover. A spread jump has a series of pvc pipes laid out horizontally and at incremental heights for the dog to leap over. The break-away tire jump is another type of jump that requires the dog to jump through a circular-shape that looks like a tire. Tunnels are set up in different configurations with the tunnel laid out completely straight or curved in forming a J or C shape. A dog must navigate through six to 12 weave poles which are 24 inches apart.

Courses typically have between 14-20 obstacles, which can include tunnels, weave poles, tire jumps, seesaws, and pause tables where the dog must stop for a set amount of time. First-timers often start out with tunnels, which can be collapsed when not in use, and tunnel holders to keep them in place. Weave poles—or a few evenly spaced upright poles that your dog can run through—are another popular at-home obstacle. At-home training equipment can be purchased online or you can build it yourself with PVC pipes. Beginner courses introduce you and your dog to obstacles, and provide the basics of how to compete should you decide to go that route.

In every self-respecting competition the only agility dog obstacle that can never be missing are hedges, walls or panels, in short, all those obstacles that must be overcome from above with a leap similar to what horses do in show jumping. The single jump for example we have two supports that hold three horizontal bars over which the dog must jump avoiding hitting them. The wall jump the regulation mechanism is the same but we have tiles on the wall that must not be dropped. Footbridge and palisade are similar to each other since the dog has to walk along some 30 wide planks which lead them first to go up and then to go down. The tunnels can be rigid or soft and as it is easy to guess they foresee that the dog slips into them and goes through them to the other end coming out. As far as the slalom is concerned, it is done by fixing to the ground a series of rigid posts arranged in a row at a fixed distance one from the other. The dog will have to ‘slalom’ passing once to the left and once to the right of the post. The long jump in which you have to overcome a series of obstacles arranged so as to occupy an area that can reach up to one and a half meters while the tire provides the classic jump through a circle in the central hole. The bascule, a sort of swinging seesaw that the dog has to run from one end to the other leaving it only when the board will have reached the ground.