반려견 훈련 성공의 열쇠: 탱크 모슬리 & 니노 드로와에르

It was a long joke, a long joke, but I remember like everybody cracked up and like years later, we were still laughing about it, but it's way too long to tell the whole joke. But the way he could tell it, that's just, you know, he got you to the edge of your seat. And I was like, yeah, it was so funny. It was a dirty joke though. So I'm not going to tell it. It was all about the delivery, right? Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Favorite movie then? Oh, favorite movie. Dad's got, I mean, I have two favorite movies all time. One is the Matrix and the other one's Pulp Fiction. That one is old. So. Nice. Favorite pizza topping. Oh, actually just Rucola. You know what that is? Yeah. Yeah. That's actually my favorite. I like it all plain. Just a little bit of that and I'm happy. Would you say that pineapple belongs on a pizza? Oh, no. No, I don't do pineapple. You do? Really? That breaks my heart. I remember the first time I went to the US ever. I went to go visit my cousin. She lives in Chicago. Well, back then she lived in Chicago. And they took me to the best pizza place in Chicago. And I remember I said, I can't eat it. I can't. Just, I don't know. There was something about the taste. I wasn't used to it. I didn't like it at all. Wow. Since then I didn't actually eat any pizza in the US that I can remember at some pizza place. Just, you know, it's a little different. Wow. Please go ahead and introduce yourself and then we're going to get started in the real questions. Sure, sure. Yeah. So my Nino, my name is Nino and I'm actually still a police officer. And right now I'm on an absence of leave. That's how they call it. So at the police you get, if you want to go do something else, they'll let you do it for a few years. I think five years in total. And this is my third year. And every year you got to renew your application. That's what I just did last month now. So, I'm still a police officer. And with this whole crisis, I was even thinking, hey, maybe I got to go back for a while. I don't know when this thing is going to, you know, blow over, but it's pretty bad. So, no, but anyways, that's what I'm doing now is I'm the founder of STS K9. That's a dog training consultancy business that travels around the world, giving seminars and camps and lectures, keynotes, stuff like that, about working dogs mainly. But my core business used to be training the canine unit and all units within the province and even on a national level. But I kept it in the province and the department itself, which is the biggest department in Belgium, Antwerp. Yeah. Gotcha. So, when developing puppies, what are you looking for in the development of a puppy?

What do I look for? You know, what I look for is talent in a puppy. And, you know, when people talk, and this is great because, you know, I've been working with a professor who is now also a part of my business. He's a pioneer in talent development and he does it, you know, obviously for people. But, you know, for me, my core business is training with dogs. And for me, a talented puppy is, you know, there's a few things that I look for criteria. First, I want to see, you know, his motor skills, even when they're very little, just how they move, how they interact, how they have these fast-twitch movements. And I like to see how they're, if you do not show them anything, like no kind of brag stuff, nothing, and just show them a little sleeve, right? And even at five, six weeks, you could see it sometimes. And when they bite that little sleeve, some of them, and they're very rare, they will spread their back paws a little bit, and they will use their own body technique to create more momentum in that grip. Now that, if you see that, now that's what I call talent, okay? So, and then if the puppy's environmentally sound, you know, that kind of stuff, that tells you, okay, these are good indications that you would like to see in a puppy. It doesn't always happen, but yeah, that's what I look for. Especially that naturally given technique. Like, if you bend their heads a little bit on that sleeve, and they like, they don't care, and they just move their body as well to lean into that, that's a dog that adapts immediately because he wants it so bad. I think that's raw talent right there. Nice. That's what I love. What comes first, obedience or protection? Oh, well actually it's a little bit of both, but obedience is definitely going to be the, you know, the main structure because at the end of the day, and that's why sometimes in my lectures I talk about KMPV a little bit, which is a great sport obviously, but what they're doing is a little bit of the opposite. Okay, so they're doing a lot of drive work, a lot of protection work, a lot of biting, biting, biting, and the dog goes crazy, right? The drive keeps rising and rising, and then you'll have to fight that drive over time, which is always a bad idea. So I like it to be, you know, the technical stuff, an obedience, technical stuff, right? That's right, Trey. And now and then he gets the bite. And me and Mario Versteppi is a six-time world champion in IGP, and I respect him a lot. He's a very, very smart, intelligent, great trainer, talented. And we had a discussion about this as well.

And maybe you want to hear his answer too, because it's really interesting. He said, as soon as I see a dog has the ability, the talent to grip something that he, you could just see, right? If you have experience, you could just see this dog's going to be good at it. He just lets it go for a while. And then he focuses completely on the obedience. And I totally get that. Because, I mean, at the end of the day, technique is so important in IGP. And you don't want a dog that's all over the place. And then, you know, you start hammering him for doing that obedience. So obedience is definitely, let's say in my case, it would be 70-30. 70% obedience, 30% protection. So do you think, because obviously who you talk to, you get different answers on that. Three things trainers will agree on is that everybody else is wrong, right? So do you think it's because they've had to settle and work with what they work with? So maybe they have to choose which one they go harder on? Well, I think it's a, I think for most people, and I look at myself where I come from, you go to a club. And, you know, you don't know that much about protection training. And you're delivered to, you know, the knowledge and the wisdom of these people. And back in the old day, I don't think it's a secret that people always started to see, okay, let's see how good the dog is and what he's supposed to do. If it is protection work, if it is protection sport, because if he doesn't have the grip, if he doesn't have the talent, if he doesn't have all that, yeah, what are you wasting your time on, right? That's how it used to be. And then they thought, okay, after 12 months, he has to out now. He has to, you know, learn how to heal and stuff like that. But overall, you know, the appearances of the dog suffered under this because, you know, the dog was getting used to, you know, doing what he loved most. And then you're going to tell him, hey, we're going to downgrade a little bit here. Now we're going to do all this stuff before you even get to do the stuff you love. And that just creates this conflict where you have to fight the dog's instinct, the dog's, you know, true nature. And that's not what I like. But I think most people, and I just had a conversation with one of my students this week. He's an IGP club and people tell him, man, you're going to do it the IGP way, this is it. Or there's no other way. You're going to do it this way. And what are you going to do? If you're a young guy, if you're a young kid, you're going to tell these old cats, hey, I don't think so. I've seen trainers on YouTube do it differently.

You're going to go, well, then go and see that trainer. You're in this club right here. You're going to do what we tell you. And it's been the same most of the time in all clubs like that. It's usually a captain and he runs a show. He'll tell you, this is what you're going to do. And it's very similar to just canine units, especially here in the States where you have training directors that it's either their way or the highway. They're not, not all of them are open like some of the guys that I deal with. Yeah. That sounds very familiar. Yeah. So where do you, where do you guys select your dogs from for the department or for the province? Yeah, for the department, look, we were unique because I saw a problem coming before it even happened. Look, what used to happen is people brought their own dogs. And, but you didn't know where these dogs came from. You didn't know anything about these dogs. You didn't know the level of training they had. You didn't know, you just, you know, okay, the guy has a dog and then they were eligible to apply for the canine unit. So basically there were only the people with the dogs that came and then you were, you know, delivered on the mercy of the quality of what they brought. And I thought, Hey guys, this is wrong because if you want to be the best unit, let's say in the world, for example, well then you're going to have to select the different criteria. Meaning you're going to have to find breeders that sell a dog, not because they want to get rid of it, because it's so bad, because the money you're offering to get that dog is good enough for them to consider it. So I like a dog that's not for sale. And because I have so many contacts, you know, from doing the sports and stuff like that, there were people that trusted me with their dog too, because that's a big thing. If you have a great, nice dog, you're just going to sell it to anyone. But if you, you know, most of the people knew, okay, he's going to Nino's department and they're going to take care of this dog. They're going to make it a really good dog. And so we had the privilege of buying dogs that were, you know, coming from excellent lines and were actually prospects. of the sport and we were able to buy them. So that was great because that's exactly what you need as a department. You can't have dogs like, you know, underachieving all the time because they don't have the talents. You need to start with a good basis of, you know, raw genetics. And that's where you build from, build on because the handlers themselves, they don't have the experience.

So it's the dogs usually that have to elevate, you know, the quality a little bit. So unless they're very experienced, that's when handler skill comes into play and experience. And then you can bring a lesser dog to become a great dog. But usually it's the opposite, right? So investing in quality for departments, I think, is a huge thing. It's going to be a game changer. And I think there's a lot of good dogs being exported to the U.S. So now they have a different type of problem is because the dogs that are getting exported, most of the time they have gone through this process of 70% bite work, 30% obedience. Or people don't control the drives. But, you know, they kind of manage to give it a PH1. But that's not, PH1 is not, and I'm sure you know that, PH1 is not going to assure you this dog is, you can control his drive. That's not going to be the case. So I think that's what the problem is then because then you get these great dogs with a lot of drive. But how are you going to manage that? Right? Because at the end of the day, you know, you're getting a product now which is almost finished. But what's your say in this? What's your say in this process? That's why I like them at a young age. And know a little bit, just show their talents, but not too much. Because there's been dogs that I got to buy, for example, that didn't want to do recall. Like a call off, I'm sorry, a call off. Like, and in the sport that's big, in the Belgian ring sport, if they don't get call offs, you know, that's when they bring out the big guns. And if that doesn't work, they have a problem. So, yeah, and I was able to buy one of those dogs. And, you know, with my system, you know, we were able to pull that off. And plus, you know, we have to admit that the standards of call offs for a police exam are not the same standards as doing a Belgian championship. So, you know, there's a difference, too. So, anyway, it turned out to be a great dog. So, we usually, you know, select from sport clubs or people that have been successful that know what they're talking about. Usually when they, like, want to push a dog on you, I'm already getting a little cautious. Weary, yeah. Yeah. So, would you, would you select a dog based off of the handler's needs or would you, and you already touched on it, but, so, like, some departments may buy a very strong dog for a handler that's first dog or, you know, needs to be brought up with the dog. What's your take on that leveling system of strong dog for a seasoned handler or maybe not like a really man stopper for a less seasoned handler? Okay.

So, I assume now you're talking about dogs that actually are already trained and you kind of give a trained dog to what kind of handler do you want to, do you want to attach it to? Yes. And actually this is something that me and the professor are working on. We're designing a tool, a psychometric tool to see what kind of talent the handler possesses. So, based on five pillars, and you know a little bit about the five pillars from my webinar that I think your missus was looking at a few weeks ago. Those five pillars, we extrapolated those five pillars on the handlers themselves. Because there's some things that we have to measure and they are measurable. I mean I'm working with a professor in mathematics, there's an algorithm that he designed to see, okay, what can we do if we have a few variables here and we put them in the mix? Where do we come? And I think that's important that you, instead of, because you know all the dog training up to what I've seen so far is all about outside in. That means you have an external source or a trainer that you like or somebody that you admire and you want to have what he has, right? But nobody looks within. Nobody like you actually say a little bit is, okay, what kind of handler is this? Is he timid? Is he confident? Is he, but what are his true talents? Because when it comes to a handler, being a good handler, what kind of talent can you think of? And I can tell you, I can give you one away. Like one of the biggest talents, one of the biggest ones that people completely oversee is intuition. And what is intuition? It's not your gut feeling. Intuition is your imagination. You foreseeing the future of stuff that you're doing with this dog before it even happens. And yeah, so that goes pretty far. So for example, you give me a dog, I never panic. I don't need to read stuff, you know, to know what I have to do next. I just have this strong vision of what my dog is going to look like through the actions that I'm doing. And these actions that I'm doing, I know exactly why I'm doing them. I know exactly where that's going to lead to. And I know that the energy of the dog, if he's high energy, it's going to match mine. And that's going to be the result. It's always, you know, a mixture or a combination of energy transfer between you and the dog. Then you have competencies. Competencies is what you teach the dog. But then you have talent, which will, you know, connect all these competencies. So the talent will connect all the competencies that you have acquired, so you can have faster results and better results and less time.

Now, if there's one thing that a department should be looking at, it's that kind of stuff. Because you want fast results and less time and efficiently. You don't want a guy that's stuck in training for two years and never becomes a dog handler. And same goes for the dog. So I think, you know, we're working on some good stuff here. Because, I mean, the professor worked with Mario. He worked with, you know, with Olympians. He's an ex-Olympian himself. He knows exactly what talent is. He's been a pioneer on talent development in Belgium. So for him to, you know, wrap his head around all this dog stuff when it comes to talent development, it's huge. It's going to be a game changer for sure. Yeah, I'm so excited about this. And I think it's just what we needed. Because like I said, even me, even you, everybody looks like, what do you want your dog to do? And we have these examples. And then we go and do the how, how to do it. And then we just train how we think it should be done. And why does that never work? Because it's not about you. It's not about what kind of person are you? I'm telling you, if you go and train with the world champion IGP, six time world champion IGP, and his system, his methodology does not match your personal driver, your personality, the way you are built from within, it's not going to work. You could spend 10 years with him. You'll not be able to pull off what he does. You see, so it's on a different level than just, okay, here's a DVD, how to do it. Right. That doesn't work. People always tell me, where are tutorials? I need tutorials. I need all of it. I need to download your brain. No, you do not. Because you can never connect the dots unless you have certain talents, like intuition, like analytical ability to in a fraction of a second know exactly what went wrong in this exercise with this dog and how you do something else or fix it in the moment. As you know, dogs live in the moment. Yeah. So if I see handlers doing stuff and it's not working, and then they're not acting in the moment, I know their analytical ability is not so great. Even though they could be excellent handlers, as in, you know, skill wise, but there's more to it. Really, there's more to it. So, does that make sense to you? Yeah, I mean, my mind is a . It does. All right, that's good. Yeah, so I went with a, I took the professor to California with me in February, and for weeks, I mean, we stayed up all night talking about this kind of stuff because we're so passionate. And passion, what is passion, by the way? Passion is the energy that fuels your talent.

So you can have somebody super talented, super talented, but if he doesn't have the passion, which happens a lot, by the way, you're not going to get anywhere. And let's say you have the talent, and you have some passion for it, but you don't have grit. You don't want to put in that work. You know what all people always talk about is putting in that work. Well, then obviously talent is not relevant. Because at the end of the day, it's about 40% talent that matters, and all the rest is what you put in it. What you put in it, especially with dog training, man. Look, it's beautiful outside. Training now is just a blessing, is a gift. But training when it's, I don't know, 10 below, when it rains, when it pours, when you're tired, when it's 5 in the morning, when you've got the kids, you've got the job going on, you've got all this stuff, but you still have this aspiration to become a good dog trainer or have a great dog, but you're not willing to go out, then talent becomes irrelevant. You can have all the talent. What talent has done for me, for example, is now I can train with a little bit of time, I can get a lot of results. Which is, this is what everybody wants, right? Is not spend like your whole day on this, but still get the results. As in, there's a lot of people that are super passionate, super passionate, and they have so much grit. They go out every day in the cold, in the rain, in the sun, they do it every day, they're not getting results either. Why is that? No talent management. No talent management. They bought the DVD, now they're doing all this stuff, they're passionate. But who's going to manage their talents? Who's going to coach these? So, that's why there's so many, I mean, and I've had the privilege to travel around the world, and I've seen so many people struggle from all disciplines, but usually they struggle with the same stuff. It's all because they're still doing the outside in movement. Meaning, always the external example that they want to implement, doesn't work. Doesn't work. You can bring out anyone, doesn't work. Doesn't work. Yes, you can be inspired by a system, you could have some, alright, these are some cool things, but you already had talent, right? You already had some of the stuff that you need. But for most people that are new, that's not going to work in a million years. I mean, look at, YouTube's filled with how to do it. Still people go, well I can't do it. But you just showed me, I still can't do it. It's also the dog, right?

Because let's say you fit in that, everything you need to become a good dog handler, and talent-wise, and your passion and all that kind of stuff. But then the dog is on a different level. Let's say the dog is not genetically built to do that kind of stuff. You have a mismatch. Because you have somebody here that wants to thrive, that wants to, you know, go out there, okay, let's get this dog. The dog doesn't want to move. The dog doesn't want to eat. The dog doesn't want to chase the ball. The dog doesn't want to do anything with a decoy. He's afraid of it. And then you get frustrations. You see that all the time. People get frustrated. Okay, now what do we do? Okay, let's implement this. Let's implement this system. There's just a mismatch of energy. We have to do what we would call them consultancy. And okay, maybe you have to manage your expectations a little bit when it comes to this dog, if you like it that much. Maybe you have to use a different methodology. Because I'm the last one that's going to tell you, hey, you want to do the ultimate control Nino implementation? It's not going to be for everyone. Because your internal driver, how you're built, has to match with that. I'll give you a good example. As you've seen, a lot of my videos are very dynamic. For people, I like to move. People, I like to be connected all the time. People, I like to be in it. People, I like to live it. But there's been a lot of successful dog training as well, doing not so much with the handler. So the dog has to do a lot of that kind of stuff. So it could go either way. But that's not important when it comes to what do you want. You want to train with the world champion? If I tell you right now, I can tell you right now. If he lays out a track, he cuts up five different pieces of food. That tiny, five different pockets, five different knives. And he takes a scoop. And each one, he scoops some dirt. And then he puts them in it. Do you have energy to do that? Does that give you energy? Do you get excited when you hear that? There's people that get excited from doing this. I do not get excited from doing that. So, I mean, that said, is that methodology going to work for me? Probably not. No. Probably not. But what if I wanted to be him? What if I really wanted to be him? Then I will do it. But because I will be less passionate about it, I will have less energy. And when I have less energy, he's always going to be better at it as me. Even when the talent was equal. You see, all these variables will give you the total outcome. So a lot of people hate tracking. And IGP, for example.

I even heard that the Americans are doing now IGP without tracking. The American IGP without tracking. It's just like, to hell with it. We're not going to do that. Because everybody hates it, you know? Not everybody, but I mean, there's a lot of people that see the tracking as a, oh man, I don't want to do this step by step by step in the corners. And that stuff's boring. They're in for the action. They want the obedience. They want the bite work. So, I can understand that. But that's it. That's why, also, a world champion needs a certain type of dog. It needs a certain type of dog that matches his driver and his energy levels. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's so deep. Yeah, because, I mean, it is deep. Because, look, if you win it six times, you can't say, this is a coincidence. Right. It's not a coincidence that you win it six times. So now you have to analyze, what's this guy doing? That makes him win it six times. Not once, not twice. Six times with two different dogs and three dogs actually doing the worlds on an extreme level. Okay, that means we'll have to study his methodology. We have to study not his methodology, but also him. You have to study him. What is he like? What gives him that kind of energy to go out and do that kind of stuff with these dogs? That's why I'm saying, look, there's a lot of people that are attracted to what I do. It doesn't necessarily mean it's what you want to do yourself. I can watch a good, you know, game, but not necessarily go, I want to be in that team playing that game. You see? So it could satisfy you or your eyes just, you know, have pleasure watching this. It doesn't mean you actually want to go in there and do that kind of stuff. Wow. So. What, so when we talk about ultimate control and your system, what sets that apart from all other training methods? Well, well, at the end of the day, we're chasing the same result, which is you want a dog that's obedient. You want a dog when you say out that he outs. So the end terms are usually the same when it comes to top competitors or people that are really driven by what they do. They want excellence, right? But I think what set me apart a little bit is I tend to use the dog's natural capabilities, his natural talent. Like, for example, the whole pillar about visuals. For me, I always, and I keep saying it, it's not about you. I don't want this dog to look at me. I'll fabricate two exercises where this dog looks at me or kind of, it seems to you that he looks at me, but he might be looking straight up. Doesn't matter. But, and that's it.

All the rest of it, I want this dog to be attracted to what he really loves is that energy source. And I'd rather manage drive than make everything about me in visuals. Like, always look at me for confirmation. Always look at me to get the release. Always look at me to get the bite. Because that's just overcompensating. So what I did is over all these years, I sat down a few years ago and I went, okay, what have I been doing? And why have I been doing this? There's a big question on why. Why do you do stuff? I see so many people do stuff. When you ask them why, they look at the other guy. Tell them why. And then this guy goes, hey, I don't know. You know, that's just how we've been doing it. There is no, you have to ask the other guy, but he left the club. So anyway, we kept doing what he was doing. So the why. So what I did is I kind of divided all this stuff into visuals, into movement, drive, vocals and grip. Because that's basically the only things that you can train within dog training. So it's either he is barking, either he is in drive and low drive, high drive. He's doing protection work. He's doing tracking. He's doing whatever. Anyways, the drives always vary. Either he is moving. But then the question is how does he move? Because, I mean, I know a lot of super obedient dogs and still people are not happy. Why not? They don't move fast enough. They don't move clean enough. They don't move explosive enough. So there's a lot of criteria, you know, tied to movement as well. And people always want to aim for the sky, which is great. But now, okay, now you need a system. What's going to get you to that kind of appearances? And I think the way I just dissected, you know, these pillars. And in the seminar, it's actually always condensed. And at camp, we really like talk about it the whole day about just movement alone, for example. You know, movement is the first thing you need to master is how is this dog going to move in conjunction with me. Because all dogs will move, yes, if you teach them how to move. But in conjunction to you, it could be always a little bit too late. Like when you move, he's always a step too late. Or it always leaves a gap. He's not saying to you. He doesn't really understand your mechanics. You want to push a mechanic on him that he has not developed, causes frustration. Right? All this kind of stuff. So the movement, by itself, is something that you need to wrap your head around. And you need to know exactly what you're doing and where that's going to get you. Like I said, having that intuition, having that vision of how it's going to look in the end, that's what it's about.

It's not like, and people want instant gratification. Get it all the time. Get a student over here, first thing you ask is, oh yeah, I see you lured. When am I going to stop luring? Well, you're going to stop luring the second that your movement and his movement are totally in sync. And dog does not have any issues flowing. That's when you're going to start thinking about fading. But they come here, they want to stop fading, but they have not even started luring, for example. And same goes with the collar, and same goes with everything. The people want it all. They want it all. And why? It's that lack of intuition. That lack of intuition. Always, because at the end of the day, I had a dog now, six months. Was he doing the kind of stuff as my previous dog? No. But I didn't panic for one second. Not one second. Because I knew maybe he'll take one month longer, maybe two months, but he is going to look the same and do the same. That's for sure. Because his capacities, or what I've been saying all the time, is his talents are not the same as Rocky's talents or Cody's talents or Enzo's talents. So it will always differ a little bit. It can't be the same all the time. But the road to getting to that end goal is going to be the same. And obviously, yeah, sometimes you go off track a little bit. To go back on track, everybody has issues and ups and downs. You think I go out there and these puppies kill it each time? No. But that's also staying focused. Don't worry. You're not always going to be on the high when you train these little puppies. Sometimes you have a low and then you've got to go, okay, suck it up. It's going to be all right. All right. And just believe in it. But in order to believe in something, you've got to have good comprehension of what you're doing. And you've got to have a clear, clear image. This is how I want things to look. And usually when people get to the point where it then should look how it was supposed to look, all of a sudden they go like, well, that doesn't look how I wanted it to look. How do we fix this? Do you hear it? How do we fix? There is no fixing. There's only creating. So now when you're going into the fixing business, that's bad, man. Because I don't know if there's one thing that dogs struggle with is, but you said A was okay yesterday and now A means B. I mean, that's confusing. I mean, let's say your dog has always been used to healing with a huge gap or this gap. And now you say he's got to move closer. He'll go, what are you talking about? We need this gap. That's how we've been running. That's how we've been rolling all the time.

And then you close the gap and he gets like, what's going on here? He tries to fight it. And that's when you get the frustration from both sides for sure. The dog's confused. Handler goes, what's wrong with this dog? Why doesn't he listen? Well, it's not about listening. It's about moving, but he just doesn't know how to move in that fashion because you just had this new idea. It doesn't mean he's going to change his ideas. And that's why I call my class Puppy University because obviously when you do it with a puppy, you can do it spot on from the day you start. And it's all going to be on you. No blame game here. It's you, right? Because a lot of people that get dogs, they say, yeah, it was the other guy. He screwed up. Well, when you get a puppy, there's no more blame game. It's you. Oh, yeah. And it always humbles you so much because the puppy doesn't care what dog you have in the other kennel that could kill it. He doesn't care about any of that. He's like, what are you going to do right now? How are you going to make him move right now at this point in this moment to be exactly the dog that you have in the kennel next door? And he doesn't care. It's about what you do. Nobody can rely. Nobody can kick his feet back in this business and say, I made it. This is it. I made it. Give me any dog. No, man. You've got to go back to back, meaning get on your knees, get dirty, cut up the food, you know, get out, you know, the dog with the leash again and do it all over again. You see, this is not a trade that once you did it, you're set for life. And same goes with all the lure and stuff. People lure and then the dog knows all this stuff and then they say, okay, we don't need it. They buy a new dog. This has happened to me myself with my second dog. And I went like, well, how did I do this? I can't even recall how I did this because it's been so long. And then that's when I, that's when it struck me and I went, man, you can't just, once you've developed a skill, you can't just let it go and then hope for the best when you get the new dog. You've got to maintain that skill. Same as with English. I mean, if I'm not in the U.S., obviously I'm not talking English every day or not to people, maybe writing. So then when I go back, it always takes me a little bit of time, a few days to, oh yeah, that's right. All right, okay, we're good. So, and the same as with dog training. I mean, if you stop doing all the stuff you did with a puppy and then all of a sudden you get a new puppy ten years later, you lost that skill. And I compare it to top athletes or any sport. Do they start with competition every day?

Of course not. Let's take a boxer. Does he get in the ring and box people every day? Of course not. He's just going to go back to the pads, do his techniques, and that's the same what you're going to do with his dog. He's always going to do technique and technique, technique, and now and then he peaks. He rises to the occasion. But he's technically so good that he always has the edge of looking really good in his competition. If you obviously manage his drive and blah, blah, blah, you know. It's a long story, but I mean if that foundation is not right, it's going to bite you back. Always. So how do you manage your personal self of comparing your dogs, Enzo and Rocky and Cody and... Yeah. You know, the thing is that you always want to upgrade when it comes to talent. So you always want more now. Now I have this incredible dog. He can grip. He can do it all. But there's also things that he is lesser at. But, you know, I'm very action driven. And he's an action dog too. So he's very rough. He has a lot of power in him. So there's a lot of things that he is different at, but that I like, which makes me forget about the flaws he has. But he definitely has his flaws, for sure. He definitely has. Like the dog Cody, for example. That's a dog that got me started in doing this. He was so technical. So technical though. His movement. That when I compare Rocky and Cody, sometimes people say, hey, I like Rocky, for example, more than Cody's videos. I don't actually, because I can enjoy technique so much. Like, yeah, I'm a technician. So when I see Cody's technique, I'm thinking, ah, Rocky's never going to be on that level. But then they see the action of this dog and they tend to be attracted to that more than maybe that stuff that maybe other people don't even see. So, but that's just me, you know. What I do need for myself is a dog that has a lot of energy. I can't work dogs that are really low on energy. If they like come out of the kennel and they're like, ah, yawn. And then they go, ah, what's the day looking like? I can't have that. And so because I'm always pumped and they, I want that same energy. You see, it's always about energy management. And they lift you, you know, to better work, to better results when they like push too. So when you push and they push, that's when you go, pshhh. Then you can aim for, you know, more and more and more. And you can become addicted. Then you're like, oh, this was so fun. All right, go sleep a little bit. I'll see you in two hours, right? I'll see you in two hours. Go sleep. That's what it's about. That's, I mean, you're a doctorate yourself.

You know what kind of kick it can give you. It's exactly that. It's that when you have that energy match, when you have that same passion, meaning you love the action, he loves the action. And then these things come together and you love it. You love it and you want more. You could do it every day. And that's what you do too, right? When that light bulb goes off, it just, it pushes you harder and harder and harder. What do you think from the business side of things, what's been your biggest business struggle? My biggest struggle is actually having a continued service in the form of a facility. As we know, man, a facility is very expensive, right? Now, and facilities and expenses or the cost of that facility is also connected to the area. Because, I mean, people always thought you can go in Texas, buy a ranch in the middle of nowhere. That's going to be low cost. Yeah, but I mean, how are people going to travel you, right? So it's always that, okay, where do I want to establish that's one, what state? And the cost of it, like California, super expensive. Yeah, it's nice to train. I mean, there is a lot of people that have working dogs, but then you have the expenses of, you know, doing that kind of stuff. So, I mean, having a solid basis with an academy, like, you know, all the stuff that you need to train dogs, law enforcement or sports dogs or even pet dogs. I mean, that requires a lot of setup. And I think the cost of that kind of setup is the biggest struggle. And I think for anyone, like, that overhead of having that kind of facility, that's huge. So, I think that's the biggest one for sure. Gotcha. What's one thing that you learned along the way that you wish you could go back and do sooner? As far as whether it be forming the five pillars or anything, just training in general. Oh, wow. That's a really good question. I think if I could go back, I would detach myself a lot sooner from the mindset of the sport. Now, I tell you that the sport has been my true passion. That's how it all started. But it gets you that fixed mindset because you only see the goals of that sport. And you kind of tend to go into that box again of this is how we do ascend away. This is how we do jumps. And this is. And you don't look to anything else anymore. Like, French ring has incredible things. They have a tradition over decades and decades. But you don't care because you're doing Belgian ring, right? What do you care about French ring? But there's some really good stuff in there as well. And the same goes for Belgian ring when it comes to grip development. And the same goes for Mondia ring.

I mean, people have gotten really better over the last decades in training dogs. And I think not being stuck so long in what I thought I was loving. Now that I'm doing something else, I'm loving this even more. Because now I can see it from a bird's eyes perspective and look at all these sports. I look at all these things, these great things they have. And then I would be able to implement more of all these things into one sooner. Instead of staying stuck in that sport. And people, I was the same guy, man. Always, if you would have asked me, what is the best sport? When I was doing Mondia ring. The toughest, the best, I would say Mondia ring. And then you go to Belgian ring, you say, hey, that's Belgian ring. The police dogs, they will tell you, man, there's nothing as tough as a police dog on the street doing his job. That's as tough as it gets. That's the real work, right? So, you know, everybody protects his game a little bit or his sport. And I get that. But now that I've passed beyond that phase, I'm like, yeah, I should have done that sooner. Just like, ah, man, it's all right. Everybody has great things in their sport. And I respect that. Nice. Yeah. What would you identify as the missing puzzle piece to a lot of training that you see here? Is it the talent? Is it what you talked about earlier? Oh, yeah. The talent management for sure. Yeah. Yeah. I remember doing a seminar once and we had a dog with us, a lab. That's a really nice dog. And these people, when they were training their own dogs, they felt like broken. They felt like, oh, I suck. I really suck at this. You know, you could feel the energy drain. You bring in that dog. You say, OK, I'll work this dog. All of a sudden, the energy went up. Like, they were getting confident. The dog was pushing them to another level just because it had a little bit more technique. It had a little bit more natural drive. And these people, like, they were actually good. But they would never know because there was a mismatch of energy. And because they were so stuck on, OK, Nino's Howe, let me implement Nino's Howe with this dog and it wasn't going to work. to work because obviously what the ultimate control is based on working dogs and if you come with a you know a full pet dog for example you need to alter this you need to you know get rid of some stuff and you know and and you can't just do a copy paste so and then it depends on okay what does this handler want does he want some kind of Iraqi that kind of dog or does he want just an obedient pet okay and what is he like he needs maybe a different dog if he has if he has

different expectations so just managing on to the core of what people are and what people want I think that is maybe the biggest take or the biggest change that can happen over the years now is more go more to the level of the B the B level instead of the how level we've all seen the house man and there's so many house you can't you can't say that the people you've had on the show before were not good at what they do I mean everybody has excellent house there's and everybody puts his own piece of work in it it's it's all good but that's where it stops so then it's either you adapt to that or nothing happens and I think you we can't just let it slip like that and that's when the professor comes in and I really like that because that is coaching that's what coaching is about is not letting go of people that maybe don't fit this but you can still help you can still coach them and be in something they really want to be but then you just have to create something else for them customize it customize I don't believe in mainstream a lot of people ask me when are you going to make a DVD I would only make it if they keep asking me really because I really believe in training that is customized to the dog and and the person behind it nice does that make sense to you yeah absolutely and I've got so many more good questions oh wow it's already 10 10 to 1 say tell me if I talk too much because it's perfect man this is awesome um explain to me the the the statement the pursuit of dog mastery the pursuit of dog mastery so what is it that if you if you if I would ask you it's a question I can reverse what for you is dog mastery what do you want to pursue when you go and get your dog out in the morning what are you after are you after a title are you after just this this symphony of movement are you after synchronization there's so many people that have different you know expectations and I think mastery is when you can do them you know realize these expectations you know complete them without struggling that's when it becomes mastery is when you feel like I don't I don't really have to dig deep to get this done I can enjoy it now I can enjoy it because as you know training a young dog I that's not the most enjoyable thing always especially when they become like six seven eight nine months you know that's that's the hardest part because you're going to have to multitask with all these leashes and collars and stuff like that and it's going to be a load that's not the the moments you enjoy most so but when you when you get to dog mastery that's when you go like I've done this I've been

through it I can go back to it without a problem because remember you're not going to let go of that skill right it's not because you've done it you will be able to keep doing it so dog mastery is just that you can complete your mission and enjoy it without hurting the dog without hurting yourself by pushing too too hard to get it done so that's what I would call dog mastery as an instructor as the founder of ultimate control when you see guys like Calvin and James performing beautifully in sync with their dogs showing off the results of the system what does that mean to you from that instructor standpoint I can tell you hands down that's the best part about being a dog coach now being a dog trainer coach and not a dog trainer to be honest with you I can enjoy that now even more than training with my dog just the the the joy these people get from getting to something like we then just called dog mastery they do it with ease and you could feel that they enjoy it and they love it I mean that's the best thing I love these student spotlights now it is these people are killing it they're actually doing such a good job I'm thinking yeah this is what it's about and so I can get more out of the spotlight because it's always been you know and his videos for over a decade I've been doing this video thing for 2000 since 2007 I've been posting videos of me and my dog and now it's a privilege to to finally show people and their dog and and showing what they love and not the dog doesn't look like it's getting stomped they look like they're enjoying it I think that's the most fun thing yeah I really enjoy it I'm so grateful that they want to share these videos with me and uh yeah I love it it's it's it's been an honor and Calvin he's very very talented he's a good mover as you know I always say man the way you move is going to define a whole lot how this dog's going to move he's a very good mover now of course it's one pillar right yeah but he also you know he has good um management of all the other pillars as well so and that's when it all comes together is okay can you do it in the super high drive can you do and obviously it's always going to get in work now there's a good friend of mine that says hey when are you going to compete again because you're going to kill it I said no that's not how it works if you want to compete you got to put your heart into it you got to have a good team you got to just wake up in the morning and go okay these are my goals again this is what I'm going to do and and that's a team effort that's as it is as

it always been a team effort it's not because I could do a lot of stuff with a dog with you know efficiency and and and more fast than other people that I would win in competition I mean the Belgian champions here that win it every year they're not necessarily the the best dog trainers but if they have a great dog they have a great team and the dog's been on an object guard for a thousand times do you think you're going to beat that dog because your name is xyz and you've done it 20 times no that dog that's on the object guard with good genetics with he's still going to he's still going to beat your ass basically so if you want to beat him you got to match up to his level of repetitions too or his amount of repetitions so if he's going out to clubs six times a week on different pitches but all different objects and he's bringing his own decoy in you better you better be be prepared for that guy because he's the one gonna he's the one that's gonna win the trial for sure or you can't be half committed and beat to my that's fully committed yeah no man no no that's why I said talent by itself is not gonna get you anywhere because those people might have not have that much talent but the grit they put in the discipline they put in the output it's they they drive like a lot I mean miles and miles and miles just to go out to this specific pitch and train this specific exercise they would sacrifice six seven hours just to train 30 minutes and I've been in that boat too like years ago yeah you know oh we've got to do a trial soon okay let me go out you know and drive for two hours train on this pitch for 30 minutes with my dog help the other guys too and then you spend six seven hours just because you need to I mean you can't just go out there and compete and no it's like and win no but I'd love to I would love to yeah I don't think it's on the same level but it's comparable but I would say decoy is the same way it's a perishable skill and you can have all the talent in the world but if you're not always doing it right oh yeah totally right yeah decoy is decoy is one of the most underestimated skills and talents I mean there's not a whole lot of people that have you know talent and that intuition too because when it comes to decoying it's not maybe the intuition of oh how is that gonna look in his obedience and stuff like that is the intuition the anticipation that you have if I move a little bit like that this dog is gonna change his demeanor his behavior and it's gonna result into this and now I'm training now I'm gonna do this that means he's gonna be stronger at a

trial but when I'm gonna be acting like I'm doing a trial I'm just gonna alter a little bit of this stuff so I have the edge on the dog and then you know decoy is always thinking of okay what is the context what are we doing now what do we have in front of us analyze in a split second you see analytical ability for a decoy is up here up here like the end one split second you have to okay now is the time to flee now is the time to move now is the time to go with the stick now is the time to show the flaw of the dog if you're in a trial if you were trial decoy there's a lot of good trial decoys but then you bring them out to training and you say okay help my dog they can't because they're used to fighting dogs like in French ring I mean it's all about agility and being fast and and accurate and then these decoys sometimes around a top level when it comes to cardio and and movement but a real training decoy I've seen 65 year old people be in a training decoy and there was nobody no young guy that could top them because they have just had that finesse of placing that foot on the right time you know showing the dog how to move in how to come off the object you know these salties these things how to help these dogs that is what a great decoy is you can just put them there with your dog and he's gonna deliver he's gonna make your dog better and he also know he also knows what goes in the minds of trial decoys because they're gonna do the opposite they're not gonna help your dog so yeah decoying is it's it's huge it said something it's a it's you dedicate a life to it right so yeah respect that one one of my coolest memories so far is being in st. Louis catching dogs in front of you when we're all out in the right in that center there so that was a beautiful center yeah it's freaking awesome so um man we could we definitely have to have round two because this was amazing thank you thank you you know like I said if I talk too much just tell me man because I think it's beautiful and I think I think everybody that's watched is really truly enjoyed this and uh it'll be on YouTube I'll send you a link so you can share it uh for people to can jump on but you know something I want to talk about is the results of this university I've seen it for myself with uh Micah and how well she's done with her puppy I'm super proud of them and I can see her implementing what she's learning and I can see that her pup is way far ahead of a dog that I had when I first began training like she like she has so uh you know the results speak for themselves and I just really wanted to commend you for what you're

putting out uh you know I'm not only fangirling right now but uh I appreciate you coming on here and sharing your information but also being available to people uh it's it's truly awesome so um where can people find you at where can people link up if they want to do private seminars what tell us about that yeah so uh the main social medias that I'm working on is uh YouTube I'm not sure YouTube is not the one it's actually Facebook STSK9 page and Instagram also STSK9 I have a YouTube channel but I have not been posting uh consistently like those are old videos and sometimes like there's a little new one but uh it's Facebook and uh Instagram and then you have the website STSK9.com where you can find more about the online training and the webinars and the private training and when the events are going to take place again because as you know we had to postpone or cancel most of the stuff so uh yeah that that's a little bit on the on the far side but uh yeah we'll get back to it as soon as uh we stay healthy all and uh and this thing gets better globally yeah we're going to be back in the U.S. doing some uh training camps and seminars so I look forward to that and thank you uh thank thank you tank for having me on your show I really enjoyed it look if I can talk about docs I could do it all day right so it's it's been an honor for me to be able to give uh you give me that platform to talk about