Cferg
Notable member
While I agree with your line of thinking if you just want your dog to swim with you in the pool. And not wanting to come out of the pool looking like you were attacked by a bear. Don’t ask me how I know.Just to add to this. As a fun extra thing to do I taught my girl to swim to me, then allow me to gather her up and hold her without any flailing or clawing. It makes life a lot easier when you don't need to worry about getting gouged while swimming with them!
But the OP said she was training for dock diving. So for that I would be making the pool as fun for the dog as possible. Let your dog jump on your head if you have to. Once the enthusiasm is there then you can start working on setting rules for the pool.
If I was training my dog for dock diving. I would be launching myself head first off that dock, while someone held my dog back. Then I would have that person release them. I would want my dog to think I was having the time of my life jumping off that dock.
I could be wrong, but I was under the impression that the objective of dock diving. Is for the dog to jump as far off the end of the dock as possible. And also I’m not sure I understand where a dock diving trainer fits into the equation? I’m not trying to offend anybody I genuinely think I’m missing something. My guess it’s just the owner or employee of the establishment and their title is trainer?