"This dog will make you cry." My Musings on my IGP Journey - so far!

This dog will make you cry."

That's what one of the top IGP helpers in the world said to me when Rumi had his very first protection session as a baby.  And then the helper offered to buy him ;-).

He was just 4 months old and was shaking with excitement for the helper, utterly transfixed, as if he had found his whole reason for living. I had to carry him away from the field, there was absolutely no way baby Rumi could walk away from this experience. It was like he had found his destiny.

 The helper said it because he knew how I train. Minimal harsh corrections. No tools. Just staying connected with my dogs. I use a gentle tone of voice. It’s just my way. And in his  vast experience in IGP (WAY more experience than me!), a dog with Rumi's drive, his genetically strong determination, his dominance, his huge physically, he would be completely unmanageable without them. He genuinely believed I'd be in way over my head. He believed that with his methods of training (corrections using e-collar), this dog would be phenomenal. But for me? This was just going to cause tears.

And he wasn’t alone.

The trainer who was advising me on whether I should pick Rumi or his littermates was definitive that for my first Mal, he would b way too much. They were right. He is way too much. He is too much everything. Too much size, too much power, too pushy, too strong, too strong willed, too determined, too much wants to fight for this peace-loving vegetable eater of a dog-mum. Other world-class helpers who have met him since he has started his training have been in awe of him, such a fighting spirit! So strong and determined! What a wonderful dog. What a difficult dog. A dog who needs no lessons in fight, in bravery.

In honesty, I completely agree. He is both things at once. He is an absolute gift of a dog to train and also he’s flipping way too much . Rumi isn't yet two. His testosterone is rising. He's becoming stronger, pushier, more dominant with every passing week. He is a ‘bit’ of a nightmare domestically. He gets stupidly aroused. His genetics to bite are powerful.There's plenty of road ahead of us and I'm not naive enough to think the road isn’t going to get way harder as he only grows in dominance, and as the testosterone continues to rise, and as I continue to work protection with him, his aggression will rise too.

But something has been crystallising for me lately in our IGP protection training. I’ve been lucky enough to have been training with Dirk Wernet, and it’s just wonderful to start to see glimmers. We ran through the IGP1 routine. Rumi is starting to look ‘ready’. Things are starting to come together in a way I wanted to share. Not as a proclamation. Not as the definitive answer.  Oh no, certainly not definitive after Rumi completely lost the plot on the very final part of the routine, the easy bit, the transport of the helper after the fun stuff is over. But we have a plan for that last bit, and as ever, the plan is to increase his clarity over what is needed for that bit, and that clarity will reduce his feelings of frustration.But in general, so far (crumbs, and this is only now 8 months into training for protection and with zero trials to test us, so this is a very, very cautiously optimistic post), I am pleased with how he is looking, and most importantly, how he is FEELING whilst he is working.

Why protection training is so bloody hard!

IGP protection is one of the most cognitively complex things we ask our dogs to do. Think about it from the dog's perspective. They must be absolutely wild and dominant with the helper, every sinew of their body screaming towards that one person. And yet, in the same moment, they must be completely attuned to their handler. They need to know, at every precise moment of the routine, whether their focus belongs on the helper or on me. Whether they should be biting or releasing. Barking or sitting. Moving forward or returning to heel.

The answer is always, it depends exactly where in the routine you are. what are the cues from the helper and handler. You must listen, you must be clear-headed, you must know exactly who to listen to, and what the answer is in that moment.

And this ask is not easy ever, but is much easier with a gorgeous little Gracie. She's wild. But of course, her genetics mean that she's not crazy, silly wild. Just perfect wild. Wild enough to do the protection, but never OTT and clear in the head to think. Just reflecting on things, she was my perfect protection dog!! Aw how I miss the days of trialing Gracie.

But with our born and bred protection dogs, it's a different matter. For some dogs, they don't have the huge drive and bravery and they have it brought out of them, so that they're going absolutely wild for the helper. And others, like Rumi, are just born knowing he has one goal, one aim in life. And both types end up in the same place. Absolutely nuts and barely with control over this thing they are truly going mad over. It's way way more than an agility dog who is wanting to jump and do the course. Because the protection brings the aggression up, which brings its own hormonal cocktail of fun into the mix.

And in all honesty, the sport has been created for dogs who are utterly wild. But then, just by some miracle, have the control. And when we see it, it can look like poetry in motion. 

But to create the picture? To train it? Well, it's really bloody hard! Think of nothing but the baddie, we tell the dog. Oh but if you don't come away from the baddie and aren't listening to me 100% that's no good either. We want both from them!

No wonder dogs get confused. No wonder handlers reach for tools to try to communicate what they need. When you have built enormous drive towards the helper and then ask the dog to switch it off on command, you are asking something extraordinary of them. Even more complex than an agility start line, where the dog simply has to wait before running. In IGP protection, the answer is never that simple.

It is, honestly, one of the things that makes this sport so fascinating to me. That extraordinary combination of utter dominance and utter obedience, or as i prefer to say it, connection, existing in the same dog, in the same moment. 

What Gracie taught me

When Gracie began her IGP journey, she came to it already as an Obedience Champion. One of the very few Australian Shepherds in history in  to hold that title. The only living Aussie with it. The record holder for the most Championship Obedience wins ever.

For her, the obedience around the helper was effortless. Her challenge was he opposite. She had spent her whole life learning to be completely focused on me, following my tiniest instruction with precision and attention. In IGP, I was suddenly asking her to place her focus elsewhere. To feel big and strong and independent. To work away from me in a way she had never needed to before.

That was her journey. Building her confidence and presence on the field. Rumi's journey is completely different.

What Rumi is teaching me

Rumi has never needed to be built up. He never needed the building that most pups need. He arrives on that field with everything already switched on. He is an absolute natural. The drive, the dominance, the aggression (in the right, IGP sense), it's all there, completely innate.

Which means I only have one job with him.

To teach him when it's appropriate to show it, and when he must focus on me.

What crystallised for me recently when two different people said two very different things to me. One said, you're lucky, your dog does great heelwork, you can always fall back on that. Another asked whether obedience training before protection work is beneficial.

So something clicked for me.  To me, training is done by showing what you want your dog to do, and giving them a reason to do it. And that’s it. And people have funny things in their heads about tools and training, that training ‘positively’ is something very different to training ‘balanced’. I don’t agree.

I don’t like the categorisations. They make me uncomfortable.

For me it’s pretty simple, we train a dog to understand clearly what to do. And if we train them what to do, we don’t need to focus so much on what not to do. We simply do our job, which is one thing, what to do.

And now I’m starting to understand I understood exactly why, so far at least, I'm able to handle this huge, wild, physically dominant Malinois on the protection field without forcing him. Without yelling at him.

My way with him on the field is to take my time. To be calm. To give him time and space to collect himself so that he can remember what the words mean that I am saying.

And what i truly believe is that the obedience which I just LOVE teaching, it’s called obedience but it’s really just connection work.  It’s not a fallback. It’s not taught as a lucky bonus. It’s the true  foundation of everything.

Rumi has such a deep understanding of my words, my commands, my cues, my intonation. We have such a deep connection with each other, he understands my energy, my thoughts, and tbh, my words way before I say them. We have a relationship that even when every single instinct in his body is screaming at him to go to the helper, one word from me cuts through. He knows what heel means. More than that, he loves to heel. He has an enormous reinforcement history for it. He finds it genuinely, intrinsically rewarding, not just because of conditioning, but because of what it means. The two of us, right there together, doing something we both love. Happy hormones flowing for both of us.

So the helper is on the field. Every fibre of Rumi's being wants him. And yet, when I ask for heel, he not only understands what I'm asking. He wants to do it. He is reinforced by doing it.

That is the piece I see so many handlers missing. Not because they're doing something wrong, but because the deep, joyful, value-laden obedience work simply hasn't been built yet. The dog doesn't have the understanding, or the love for the behaviour, to be able to access it when the helper is right there in front of them. It’s the most helpful default behaviour in IGP. 

And it’s not at all easy to teach. And when we do our protection work, the heelwork gets messy, gets pushy. But it’s still there. That clear connection with our dogs even when every muscle in their body is crying to work with the helper.

So far, no force has been needed.

In Rumi's protection journey, which is only a year in, there have been no harsh corrections. No tools. He understands the words. He has a high reinforcement history for the control behaviours. And so, even on his wildest days, he finds it possible, if not always easy, to do what I'm asking.

I say so far deliberately. He is not yet two. This is a long road.

But I do want to chart my progress with you. Honestly .transparently. Because it’s an interesting road to travel. It will be windy, it will be bumpy. But I just hope it’s long and I hope it’s interesting and very scenic and maybe takes me to some wonderful, or just interesting destinations.

But what I'm beginning to believe, more and more, is that the bridge between drive and control isn't force.

It's relationship. It's understanding. It's a dog who trusts you enough, and loves working with you enough, to choose you even when every instinct is pointing somewhere else.

That's what we're building. One training session at a time. 💛🐾

PS- And I'm being VERY brave by telling you that I do have our IGP1 in the diary for November! He'll be just over 2 years old then. So we have a few months, to build our clarity, build the connection, and of course, in trial anything can happen. And I won't be hiding from you, pretending I didn't care. Or pretending I'm not trialing. I'm going out there, and we'll just see how this journey goes. What' the worst that could happen after all? Some ego damage to me, well, i'm big and strong enough to cope with that. And the fun for you will be watching as all of these high hopes and lofty ideas are brought right down to earth in trial!!

Date: 27th August 2026