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Tiny Flyball Brag


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Last weekend (August 20th-21st), Grace ran in her first sucessful flyball tournament, and earned her FD and FDX titles.

 

Our previous attempt at competition didn't go nearly as well. We had lost our height dog due to injury, so Grace, at 18 inches, was tapped for height dog duty. She had never jumped 14 in. jumps before, plus it was a county fair environment with lots of strange sights, smells, and sounds.

 

At that first tournament, her first heat was perfect, but she seemed surprised by the taller jumps. Her second heat, she deftly avoided all the jumps on the way back from the box. She balked at all the jumps on practice runs after that, at which point we substituted her out for another dog, and that was it for her first tournament.

 

At the competition last weekend, which was up in Stanwood, WA, we almost scratched the whole tournament before it began. We had a couple of veteran dogs cancel due to family emergencies, and our practice right before the tournament was pretty horrible. Grace was still not consistantly taking all the jumps, and she seemed to be intimidated by passing. We did have a pair of height dogs from another team who came up and ran with us, otherwise we absolutely wouldn't have gone.

 

Since we were so short handed at this tournament, Grace ran in every race, eight on Saturday and eight on Sunday, for a total of 64 heats. She ran perfectly in all but two heats. She wasn't one of the fastest border collies there, as she doesn't have a lot of leg, but running lead dog her times were 4.5 to 4.6 seconds, which I think is pretty decent.

 

I'm so proud of her I could explode, both for running so consistantly and getting over her fears, and for being so well behaved and such good company over the whole weekend away from home.

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Congratulations - doesn't sound like a tiny brag at all! Most dogs don't do very well seeing 14 inch jumps for the first time in a tournament - especially when it is their first tournament as well. For agility folks 14 inches doesn't seem like much, but it's a totally different ball game (pardon the pun) in flyball ; ) I'm glad she was able to come around well in her second tournament. Sounds like she's doing great!

 

Dana Nichols

Greeley, CO

workinglabs@comcast.net

www.workinglabs.net

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  • 4 years later...

Heh - sorry for the ancient thread necromancy, but it's been a couple years since I've posted anything here. It's fun strolling down memory lane every once in a while.

 

Grace is a complete flyball veteran now, earning her Flyball Master title at our tournament back in April. She's even attended several tournaments without me, as she'll happily run for any of our team handlers. Instamatic flyball dog, just point and shoot.

 

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What a wonderful and good girlie dog for stepping up for mom and conquering her fears! Sounds like the both of you had lots of fun. 64 runs sounds like quite a bit for a green dog! You have every right to be tickled pink about her

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What a wonderful and good girlie dog for stepping up for mom and conquering her fears! Sounds like the both of you had lots of fun. 64 runs sounds like quite a bit for a green dog! You have every right to be tickled pink about her

 

Thanks much for the nice words! Just to be clear, though, that first posting I made in this thread was from 2006, when we just started out. I'm also "Dad", and not "Mom"...

 

We've been together now for five years, after adopting Grace from PNW Border Collie Rescue at just under a year old. She has many great flyball tournaments under her belt now, as well as a fair bit of agility and not nearly as much sheep herding as Grace would like. Given her preference and natural ability, she'd make a pretty fine herding dog.

 

This past Summer we also added a small-ish auxiliary dog to the mix, adopting him from a litter one of our team mates was fostering for the local animal shelter. Now Grace has to put up with an annoying little step-brother. She is taking it pretty well, and plays bitey-face quite nicely.

 

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