Flyball Training, New Year New Games
The guys were rocking flyball training today. We’d already arranged to do some Starter/Puppy training this morning, and Kim had long-since being volunteered as Stooge Dog, but our tournament tomorrow has unfortunately been cancelled. So the whole gang got to come and play!
The Starters did very well, we still have a lot of work to do (especially boxwork!) but they all did some excellent recall work, either on their own or against the Stooge Dog Kim.
I like our Stooge Dogs to be focussed on the game, experienced and unflappable, but not overexcited and hyper. Medium height dogs are best, especially for changover work, as large dogs can be intimidating to nervous Starter dogs, and small dogs aren’t “obvious” enough. Ideally, the Stooge Dog shouldn’t be slow either, but there’s no point putting in a super-fast dog initially against a Starter as it’s too tempting to run out of the lane to chase. The Stooge Dog is there to show the Starter that there will be an opponent, but not to be an idiot. Kim is a very good Stooge Dog!
Katie paired the rest of the dogs up and they each did some boxwork, some Chase Recalls, and some handler-chasing full-runs. I felt really happy with how Dylan worked, I think he really benefits from this kind of specific training. I had a feeling Kim would too, and she definitely did, I haven’t seen her run so fast in ages! She loves doing Chase Recalls, she’s a typical lurcher-type in that regard. We timed her last run and she clocked a 4.9 over 12″, which really is pretty good for a 10-yr-old who is way off her normal jump fitness. Very proud of my old lady!
Mollie is a special case, because she is such a lunatic it’s not safe to do “normal” boxwork with her, so we just spent a lot of time chasing her off the box and getting her stretching away. It seemed to be working, but I think it will take Mollie longer to benefit from this kind of training than it will Kim or Dylan.
We aren’t competing at flyball again until the end of February, so we have a good block now where we can really get training and focussed on really improving the dogs for summer.
2 Comments
Katie
Kim did 4.9s….but tbh, when I look at the video of Diva on her recall, I think the box is at least a foot further back then it should have been lol! I thought she looked faster than 4.9s…so she was probably more 4.7 and Chip more 4.4!
Leanne
Haha, oops! 😀 It was impossible to keep the box in place, it was sliding all over the place in the snow even with the pins in. Anyway, I’m pleased as punch with 4.9, so if we can actually get 4.7 out of her this year I’m going to be way too overexcited all summer!