Toronto’s All About Dogs connects the four-legged and two-legged friends

Taco, a four-year-old dappled Dachshund, launches himself over the crossbar of a hurdle on the agility course.

“Taco! Tunnel!” calls out his owner, Toronto schoolteacher Cindy Yip, signalling the next move. She angles her chest toward the entrance of the nylon tube to help direct him. As he zooms out the other end, Yip hesitates, momentarily forgetting which obstacle to send him toward next — not surprising, as they’re on the 16th element of a 20-step sequence. But it’s enough to break the momentum, and Taco becomes instantly frustrated, barking out his disapproval.

“I know, I know, my bad!” Yip says with a laugh.

Yip and Taco are two of the dozens of regular participants in agility training classes at All About Dogs. Operating in a retrofitted former carpet warehouse in the Caledonia Road/Eglinton Avenue area, the facility spans 15,000 square feet of rubber-matted training courses arrayed with jumps, tunnels, teeter-totters and elevated trestles, where dogs and their humans work together to run through complex sequences in a fast-moving pas de deux.

“What fuels me is this real connection that people get with their dogs,” says All About Dogs owner and founder Reneé deVilliers.

It was the need to help her own dog overcome a variety of behavioural problems that led deVilliers to dog training 22 years ago. Previously an actress, she was attracted to the spectacle and performance aspects of agility. After apprenticing, studying techniques from around the world and ultimately starting her own business, today she offers, in addition to agility training, obedience classes, private sessions for dogs with specific challenges, as well as grooming services.

The goal of agility training is for the handler to lead their dog through a course of around 20 obstacles as quickly and accurately as possible. But this training is not merely pieces of apparatus laid out in a straight line; the route twists and turns and often circles back on itself, challenging the commanding human to remember the sequence while directing the pooch. DeVilliers says the focus is on people and their dogs learning to connect and communicate through body language and verbal commands.

“People learn to understand their dogs,” she says. “What motivates their dog? What is it that the dog is hearing? What is it the dog wants? And together they need to find these things out in order to play this game. And to really get good at it, you need to be in the moment.”

When running the course, deVilliers adds, “there’s this Zen-like moment of living those one or two minutes, completely connected to your dog. There’s an electricity about that that is phenomenal.”

From its roots as a sideshow at equestrial events, and popularized by performance groups like SuperDogs and acts on TV’s “America’s Got Talent,” dog agility is now an established sport around the world, with recreational and competitive events held in every Canadian province. The American Kennel Club registers more than one million entries into its agility programs across the U.S. each year.

DeVilliers has seen nervous, self-protective, untrusting dogs gain new confidence and social skills as a direct result of agility training. And she sees human participants reap therapeutic benefits.

The two-legged participants at All About Dogs range from age 12 to 80 – including students, a truck driver, a university professor and a neurosurgeon. The dog breeds are equally diverse: deVilliers counts many border collies and Australian shepherds among her charges, as well as chihuahuas, dachshunds, mixed breeds, rescues and even a beagle (a breed some believe to be untrainable, says deVilliers).

“A lot of people love agility training because they’re learning something completely outside of their realm,” deVilliers says. “I think they like to come out and say, ‘Teach me something I’ve never learned before.’”