The up and down together
The up and down together is used in the breed ring when a judge would like to compare two dog’s rear and front movement together. In handling it shows control of the handlers and can compare two handler’s straight lines and presentation. Sometimes a judge will want the up and down once or twice, some will stay put and some will move to one side (this is where it gets complicated).
The idea is that the two dogs are kept together at all times and to achieve this one handler will start their dog on the right side and the other handler will start their dog on the left side and at the top, if the judge hasn’t moved, both handlers should do an inward turn so the dogs are still moving together.
If the judge moves to one side, the handler furthest away from the judge goes back first and the other handler follows behind. Then, stopping one behind the other they both would turn and follow each other the other way back to present in front of the judge.
Move the dogs at the correct speed. If one is slower than the other then wait for them at the turn.
Before you set off on the up and down ask the handler you are running with if they are ready. You don’t want to go trotting off to find the other handler hasn’t yet got their lead sorted.
Once the movement is finished dogs should be stood parallel to the judge with the gap directly opposite the judge’s feet. Both dogs should be back to back or facing the same direction. Never have the dogs facing each other (eyeballing) as if they are two male dogs then this could cause trouble.
Sometimes you may find that you come up against a handler who doesn’t know this exercise very well and they get confused. If they do get confused then politely tell/guide them where to go on the turns. This shows the judge that you understand what is meant to happen and is better than having someone else ruin your chances of winning.
This can also be a great training tool to use in training to get control from your dog and get them to ignore other dogs. Even if you never need to do this exercise in the ring, training it will help teach your dog to ignore other dogs running close by in another ring.