Selby

Just two days to go until Dylan’s big flyball debut! It’s going to be really odd doing Starters again, Kim moved up to Sanctioned tournaments in 2005. Hopefully it will be a good experience for him. I’m confident that he knows what he’s doing and won’t be phased by the atmosphere, as he’s been going to flyball tournaments to watch the girls pretty much since we got him. Obviously being in the ring is another step, but the only real difference is that there will be another team with strange dogs rather than dogs he knows. Providing all the dogs on the other team are reasonably trained, we’ll be ok!

Sadly there seems to be an increasing trend for teams to be entered with dogs who have done little training, especially against another lane. My biggest fear about this Friday is that another dog will run across and scare my poor boy. Dylan is the biggest wuss on the planet, and he sometimes lacks in confidence. I can well imagine him being completely freaked out and going into anxious-Dyl-mode, which will mean he loses all his speed and therefore his lovely boxturn that we’ve worked so hard on.

Luckily the rest of the team is a bit more experienced. Beautiful Poppy and Harvey have both competed for a long time – Harvey usually runs in our “big teams”, and Poppy is our reliable lifelong Starter dog. As Amber is an agility dog and used to the high-pressure situations, I hope she’ll be fine too. Really it’s just the big boys to worry about, Chip and Dylan!

Kim and Mollie are both running in Barking Owlers on Saturday morning, which I’m really looking forward to. Kim seems to have really improved today, probably because (as I said in my last entry comments) It seems like ages since we last did a competition! Finally back outdoors on grass too, so we’ll have to see what kind of times we run to start off the season. All the pad protectors and harnesses are washed and ready to go, and by the look of the weather report Mollie will need to wear a different set of her pad protectors in the afternoon session, I have a feeling her morning ones could be too muddy! Decisions – pink or purple first?!

I’m going to try and get some video of all three of them running to, providing I can find a camera(wo)man!