Online Class Testimonials

My dog is running in Masters and has been trained from the start under Stacy’s tutelage, but I still found this class helpful and useful. Stacy has done an outstanding job presenting her excellent material, providing demonstration videos, and giving quality feedback to the working students. I audited the class, but found students’ videos and Stacy’s feedback both helpful and inspiring. We should always reinforce these foundations. Auditing the class has put the fire under me to go back and work on them again. Thanks, Stacy! As always, you are the best!

This foundation class was awesome!!! I have a 2 year old Dobie and did foundation when she was a puppy. We covered a lot of informational, not nearly what we covered with Stacy. I have learned so much about drive and I love the fact that Stacy wants you not just to get it but be brilliant at it!! There are so many instructors out there that don't want you to be as good as they are, Stacy is not one of them. I am one of the lucky ones that lives in San Diego and is able to attend her classes and seminars. This on-line seminar is like icing on the cake!!!!

I am so grateful that Stacy agreed to do this class. While I’ve heard (and tried to put into practice) much of this info before, Her demonstrations and feedback have given me a new understanding and helped me take a giant step forward in my understanding of dog training. Seeing results so quickly was gratifying, and I continue to work on improving mechanics so we can further progress. Drive and focus are so vitally important, I will continue to use this knowledge throughout my life with my dogs.

Stacy- the waiver you should have had ME sign would have read: ”I’m not responsible if your previously careful poodle will start chasing the toy like a madman and will run into walls trying to get it.” I really have to watch where we’re playing now- my floors are all wood and slippery. Never been a problem before!

Stacy Winkler's on line course is outstanding. It is well organized. You get an excellent writeup of each lesson and a video demonstration. It is very easy to follow and you have the video to constantly go back and check. This is the best on-line course I have ever taken!! I am so glad I signed up for it. I will be doing the next ones for sure. Thank you Stacy.

I am fortunate to live close enough to train with Stacy, but I took the online course anyway and am so-o-o happy I did! While I’ve run two dogs in agility, I got them when they were 2 and now have my first agility puppy. To have this information in writing to keep forever is, to me, invaluable. The lessons help me to keep on track and progress training in a logical manner and to not jump ahead when you haven’t mastered the initial steps. The videos are great and really demonstrate what we should be striving for. I’m taking the second session of the foundation class, but will keep going back and working on the first lessons with both of my dogs as well. Thank you, Stacy, for taking so much time to critique our videos and for always wanting the best for all of us who love the sport of agility!

My miniature poodle, Katie, and I earned our MACH on July 8, 2006. It took us 4 years to accomplish this. Katie is my first agility dog and my poor handling caused 99% of our errors. My awesome girl loves the sport and always does what she thinks I want her to do. A friend recommended Stacy to me and I started with her in September of 2005. At that time, we had 11 double Qs. The last 9 came from Thanksgiving weekend, 2005, to July 8, 2006. During that time our showing was limited and I was out of commission for about 6 weeks due to back issues. There is absolutely no question in my mind that my work with Stacy made the difference for us. Would we have our MACH now if I hadn't started training with her? I doubt it.

I wish all my students came to handling class with this set of foundation skills at their disposal!

This is fabulous news! I am glad Stacy has decided to offer a repeat of this on-line foundation class. I desperately want to spend more time on these skills to perfect them. I missed all of this foundation work with JazzMean in the first place which is why I signed up for Stacy Winkler's foundation class. I am so happy that I can continue these lessons without feeling rushed. I am already seeing the benefits of this foundation work on the agility field with my excellent level dog! It is never too late to improve foundation skills. I will take this class again and anything else Stacy has to offer. She is an amazing instructor and holds students accountable with a gifted eye for detail! Stacy knows how to teach all ability levels. Thank you very much for this opportunity,

As a Canadian snowbird, I am very lucky to be able to train with Stacy during the winter months in Vista, California. During the rest of the year, I’m equally lucky to be able to train through her online classes. I have audited both Foundation classes and have learned so much from reading and re-reading each lesson and working through each exercise on my own. Stacy provides a video demonstration of each lesson and shows very clearly the mechanics and technique required to master each skill. Watching the student videos and reading Stacy’s comments to each person is extremely helpful. Stacy’s eye for detail is just as acute in her online classes as it is in person, and each working participant receives great feedback and support in every session. It is very clear from reading Stacy’s comments that her goal is to help her students and their dogs to improve in their agility careers, to grow in confidence, and to find the joy in working together as a team. That has certainly been my experience in training with Stacy!

My name is Sarah and I want you all to meet my golden retriever Meeko, my 2nd agility dog. His love for life is amazing, however his love for agility was lacking. Meeko was slowly shutting down. He struggled with ring anxiety, would leave the ring at any given chance (after just one jump sometimes), and once he made a mistake in practice, he would shut down and proceed to sniff, run off, go visit the other students etc. There were many times I considered quitting agility with him as the fun was quickly escaping for both my dog and me. I felt defeated... and it just wasn't enjoyable anymore.

I would love to just express how very much I am enjoying Stacy's online Foundation Class. We live in Australia and I have been so lucky to be able to benefit from her Tuition even though we are so far away. I am doing my Foundation work with Tessa a Border Collie who I imported from the USA and have only had for four weeks now. Tessa is One year old and the transition of Quarantine and a new country have been a massive adjustment for her and I. Stacy's class has helped her and I gain the confidence of being able to work together under distractions and in new environments. It has been a godsend. I have also used her lessons on my rescue dogs who are Standard Poodles and it has helped them with a lot more drive and focus for work. Stacy is honest and to the point with a sense of humour. I love working with her and her attitude to improving my skills as well as my dogs. They have been so beneficial and I am already signed up for more. Cannot wait!!!

Eleven years ago I was introduced to Stacy Winkler. I had tried many agility instructors before meeting Stacy. I was just not satisfied with their teaching. In my very first lesson with Stacy, I was blown away by what she was saying and I knew I had found the perfect instructor for me. Stacy’s understanding of great dog training and the importance of a solid foundation as well as her attention to detail, was just what I was looking for in an instructor. With Stacy’s help, my husband Mel and I have put twenty agility championships on four of our standard Poodles. Stacy has helped me bring along my extremely fearful and stressed from birth young Poodle. Many of you have seen this young Poodle, UPGRAYEDD, that has gone from not wanting to leave the startline or looking for a way to escape the ring, to her MXJ in just a few months. Stacy has helped me take this dog that had absolutely NO drive at all and build drive and work ethic into her. This dog now loves agility. Stacy is just as talented at helping students with super high drive dogs as well as low drive dogs. Our very fast Border Collie, Crush, was out of control when we started her with Stacy. She would run off to chase other dogs, screamed when she saw movement of any kind, flanked jumps and had very little focus at all. Stacy helped us to channel Crush’s high drive and show her how much fun it is to be in high gear AND have self-control at the same time. Stacy is brilliant when it comes to teaching students how to maintain speed and drive, while creating great control behaviors and understanding on course. Stacy’s online course takes students on an incredible training journey. She uses videos and text to demonstrate the mechanics and skills for each lesson.

Lucky me, I am able to take classes in person from Stacy Winkler on a regular basis. But, I have to say I am LOVING her new online Foundation class! What I love about the online class is having a series of lesson plans clearly written out along with video demonstrations showing what we will be working on and the proper mechanics of teaching each new skill. The videos are awesome! It’s been great to be able to watch Stacy’s timing and mechanics when teaching these skills. Many of her students have been asking her to put together some videos, and now we have them! Being able to watch the videos over and over has been really helpful to me. I have also learned a lot by watching the student videos and reading Stacy’s comments on what she loved about the session and which areas she thought needed improvement, and why. Even though I am a “regular” student of Stacy’s I have learned a lot with this first online class, and I’m looking forward to the next one. Stacy has a keen eye for detail and has the teaching skills necessary to explain things clearly. She knows what it takes to be successful in agility. And by success I don’t just mean titles and ribbons, or getting around a course successfully, although all of that stuff is is on my list. I want my dog to have great skills, follow my body language, and have a clear understanding of my cues. I want my dog to be happy, fast, confident, eager to learn and perform, and be a team player. I want my dog to LOVE agility as much as I do. Stacy teaches all of that!

I have been training dogs for 30 years and have put Championships on my dogs in Breed, Obedience and have over a dozen MACHs in Agility. I took Stacy Winkler’s Foundation class with my 6 mo old mini poodle and I think it’s wonderful. I just love the Rule Outs work and the rest of the lessons too. Some of it is a little review for me but much of it is either new or a twist on things I have done in the past and my puppy is really getting some great foundation work!

Stacy Winkler rocks!! I just finished on online foundation class with her for my agility puppy. In the midst of her regular teaching and trial schedule, she made time for every student's videos and questions, including the auditing students. She broke down the clips bit by bit, giving constructive tips along with praise and encouragement every step of the way. Her lessons include her own testimonials and break down each drill into easy to follow steps. She provided clear demonstrations of all the behaviors with her own, and others, dogs on video. Since I'm a visual learner, this was the best!!!! Watching Stacy work with her own dogs gives the clearest example of how my relationship with my own dogs should be......for play, work, and even correcting them when they give me a different behavior than I'm asking for. Although she really puts me through the paces, and asks for increasingly better performances from me, I can't wait to start my next class. It's evident she wants to bring out the best in me and my dogs, as a team. And above all, she's taught me to find the FUN in all training!!