Dylan's 2008 Review
We just had one goal at the beginning of the year.
- Dylan to get his 200 points (Flyball Dog Award) in BFA Flyball
And we achieved it! It shouldn’t have been hard and somehow it really was, but my tall boy did get it in his first Open tournament.
He started competing in agility on January 19th, at EMDAC. Since then we’ve had a handful of top-10 placings this year, and qualified for the BAA Grand Prix Introductory Jumping Final, which was way beyond what I thought we were going to be capable of this year. We did get E’d in the Final, but it was on our trouble spot of the weaves and he actually ran really well, he coped better with the atmosphere than I had anticipated. We had some low points; we didn’t start training on a regular basis until May, and then we had to deal with some baby-dog issues (weave popping, dogwalk fear, flying/stopping on the seesaw) that I don’t think would have become a problem had we had access to equipment and regular training earlier. In the last few of months Dylan really seems to have matured in agility, he’s been getting much more confident and has shown some serious flashes of potential. If I can tap into that, we could be ok. (Of course, having a serious dogwalk fall hasn’t exactly helped that. I think at least the first few months of 2009 will be overcoming that issue.)
Flyball was a very up and down year, but we did finally move from Starters to Open tournaments. Dylan is now running solidly in a team, his boxwork is looking good and he has clocked some decent Singles times without ever being really pushed. He got his FD first time out and is actually well on his way to his FDI, he should have that by the end of the winter season. He doesn’t seem to be running as well indoors but that may just be his preference, a lack of experience, or Sutton Fields was a fluke. We won’t know for sure until this time next year, but that’s half the fun!
So, our goals for 2009.
- Dylan to win out of Grade 3 (on points or wins)
- Dylan to win out of Introductory (Jumping and Agility)
- Dylan to gain his 3000 points (Flyball Dog Graduate) award
- Dylan to gain at least 100 Agility Warrant points
Probably a bit too ambitious but I feel like I need to set high targets with Dylan otherwise we both relax a little too much, play about, and don’t do any proper training.