As a handler, Nicole wants to ensure that her dogs enjoy the experience as much as she does. She has spent years learning how her handling plan and what she does on course affects her dogs’ performance.

After years of back issues affecting her ability to compete in the ring, Nicole has been working on balancing her time between training her handling skills with her own conditioning program. Combined with an interest in perfecting her mental game, Nicole sees herself as a handler committed to self-improvement both inside and outside the ring.

Years ago Nicole adopted the motto, "Improving dogs' lives one handler at a time." She has been committed to helping students understand how their actions and time spent training affects their dogs’ interpretation of agility.

Her #1 goal has been to teach her students how to "speak dog". Fueled by her experiences with the OneMind Dogs philosophy, she now teaches classes with a focus on the dog's line and how each Technique affects it. She is committed to making the dog's job as clear as possible with an emphasis on consistent criteria when training running and stopped contacts and loves to work on teaching clarity to the dog on all obstacles.

In classes, Nicole utilizes goal setting exercises and constant self-evaluation for each student in order to help them become more aware of their own training commitment and overall experience. Each and every class is geared to maximizing the dog's experience as well as the handlers understanding of the game.

Nicole loves living in the mountains of Colorado and spends whatever free time she has balancing between hiking the beautiful Rocky Mountains and visiting many dog friendly microbreweries to sample the local flavor. She is an avid writer and has been published in several dog-related publications and a few non dog related ones as well. She is known as the Red Dog Runner with a houseful of four red Border Collies and one red Australian Shepherd.

Certificates

OneMind Dogs Coach	OneMind Dogs Foundation for Agility	OneMind Dogs Handling Techniques 1	Mental Training: Tools for Life