Your dog drags you down the street
Leash pulling
A leash is a tool for leading your dog. Pulling is your dog leading you. Those two words fight each other. It's an oxymoron.
At first the pulling was annoying, but you allowed it — and without knowing, you reinforced it. Maybe you bought a nice new harness, because someone told you it would help and wouldn't choke your dog. Now they pull you every walk, and they've started barking, even lunging, at other dogs and at people. You're both frustrated, so you turn around and go home. And here you are.
What are you searching for? You don't have to read the rest to get started.
Get StartedTaught by Garrett Ridley — twenty years of dogs, and he wrote the book the training runs on.
Why is your dog pulling on the leash?
Your dog isn't trying to be the boss of you. Your dog is doing what its drives tell it to do.
Every dog carries four instinctive drives — prey, social, civil, and defense. Every dog carries them in different amounts. What makes one dog pull is not what makes the next dog pull. That's why the collar that worked for your neighbor's dog does nothing for yours.
On top of the drive sits the opposition reflex. Put pressure on a dog and the dog leans into it. That's why sled dogs wear harnesses — the harness spreads the pressure across the chest and shoulders, and the dog drives forward into it. It's built to make a dog pull. That's the tool you were handed to stop the pulling.
And underneath all of it, pulling works. Every step forward on a tight leash pays your dog again. A drive that gets paid every day gets stronger every day. That's the progression you've been watching, and it's why the barking showed up.
How we stop the pulling
We stop paying the pull, and we use your dog's own drives to bring it back to you.
First your dog's temperament is evaluated — drives, disposition, engagement. A confident dog towing you and a worried dog fleeing ahead of you may look the same from behind but need much different handling. The evaluation tells us which way to work your dog.
Then your dog gets a map: the foundation first, the handling and training the walk depends on, then chapter 38 itself. You'll be the one holding the leash, and we teach you what to do with it. The leash stops being a source of fight and becomes a positive conversation tool.
The finished picture isn't a dog locked in heel for an hour. It's a dog on a loose leash, aware of you, moving with you — and heel there when you ask for it.
20+ years · author of Building A Solid Canine · every dog is evaluated first
Three ways to start.
And the first one is just watching. No pressure, no dog to bring.
General Admission
$50
The full Saturday, lecture only.
Come learn the system and watch the evaluations. Garrett teaches the Foundation — what drives your dog and how training is actually built — then reads dogs live in front of the room. No dog of your own to handle, nothing to manage, just the day and a notepad.
Placerville, CA. The workbook is optional — $50 at the table if you want one.
Working Evaluation
$200
The full Saturday, and your dog is evaluated live by Garrett.
Everything in the lecture, and then we read your dog in front of the room — what drives him, what kind of dog he is, how he works with you. You leave with your dog's training map in writing.
Comes with it:
- The printed workbook
- The full digital book
- Your dog's report and week-one homework on your free owner account
Every dog is evaluated first. All dogs welcome with accurate disclosure, including dogs with a bite history. One adult handler and one dog per spot. Placerville, CA.
In-Home Session
$400
Two hours at your house, built around your dog.
Garrett comes to you, evaluates your dog where the problem actually lives, builds the training map, and teaches you the work with you holding the leash. Everything in the Working Evaluation comes with it.
We book in-home by phone so we can ask about your dog first.
Tuesdays and Thursdays, within fifty miles of Placerville.
Workshop seats close the Wednesday before at 9 PM. Fifteen of each per date. All sales are final.