Amana, IA flyball

It was SOOOOO fun to be back at flyball! Man it's been a long 5 months since the last tournament. During the time off Raven was spayed and I worked on her box turn. She was rounding the box and she would come off wide. We worked on getting her to spin more and based on how she looked this past weekend it seems to have really helped, she had very few wide turns. Even in the last race of the day on sunday she was still turning well and putting in 4.4 times. She had as many 4.4's this weekend as she probably had all of last year. I can't wait til she really gets in peak condition. I know we're going to hit some 4.3's and cross your fingers for some 4.2's!! I think she's really improved how to handle her feet and position herself on the box to get the ball, during a race she didn't bobble at all during the whole weekend.

Mr. Rush thought flyball was both fun and stupid. Stupid because he had to spend most of the weekend in the crate in the car, but really really fun when he got to go in the building. I stood next to the lanes and propped him on my feet like he was going to start, then screamed READY RUSH!!! He was whining and jumping to go. Once he was all worked up in a frenzy then I gave him his tug and let him take his frustration out on it. Don't get too close to him when he is giving it the death shake. It really hurts when it whips around and catches you across the legs, arms or face!

Hopefully we'll get to practice flyball Friday night. On Saturday, Raven and Cherish are in an AKC agility trial at Purina Farms and then on sunday only Raven gets to go back. It is the Aussie National Specialty show and on sunday the trial is for Aussies only. I'm hoping she does really well there. Tonight I set up two sets of 6 weave poles about 12 feet apart. With both dogs I worked each set of 6 separately; starting between the two sets, rewarding between the two sets, rear crosses and with Cherish practiced moving away from her at an angle while she was weaving. Good Girlie! She stayed in and finished them even with me moving away. I didn't want to tempt Raven with that. Looks like we'll be out there every night this week - rain or not!