I think that there is a ton of value in teaching foundation, breaking down sequences and working all the pieces and parts of the exercise/course. I also believe that there is tremendous value in just powering through a course, not giving up, and learning to improvise with what the dog gives you. They aren't always going to do what you expect. :)
I am taking Silvia's Handling 1 class with Hoot. This morning I set up one of the courses and decided that "powering through it" was my objective. I ran the course with both Tangle and Hoot. You can see that both dogs reacted slightly different on this course and we powered through.
When I was running this course with both dogs I was being a bit conservative. I want to re-run it "balls to the wall" so da speak and see what kind of commitment and trust we have in each other.
Thoughts on the sport of dog agility and the training of the team