WELCOME

The first thing that I have to say is "IT'S SPRING". Maybe it's age, maybe it's just plain getting tired of the cold, ice, and snow but I'm really glad that summer is almost here. The only thing about spring is the mud. Every time you let the dogs out they come back in coated (and that's not talking about fur). I think that my dogs have seen the bath tub this month as much as I have. Now all you have to do is tell them bath and they head for the bath tub and climb in all by themselves. Tournaments this time of the year are great. It's cool for the dogs to run but you have to remember to carry plenty of towels to wipe off feet. Recent news in the flyball world is the new unofficial records that have been set recently. The first one comes from High Performance Border Patrol that set a regular division time of 16:76 on Mar. 15th at the Total Recall's Stouffville Tournament. At that same tournament Instant Replays 4 breed team set a new 4 Breed record of 17.26. These times will be made official as soon as the video tapes can be reviewed by Executive Board members to make sure that there were no early passes that were not caught by the sensors. An official world record was set in England on Mar. 30th at the Techni-Cal Maidstone 97 tournament where The Jets flyball team ran a time of 16:75 in a regular breed division.

Congratulations for the following dogs for achieving their Onyx awards the second highest award in flyball: Buick, Jack Russell Terrier, owned by Annette & Eric Tindall Quest, Border Collie, owned by Chuck Kline Lexi, Mix, owned by Sue Borup Shaden, Border Collie, owned by John Seward

Here is a little thing that I picked up off of the flyball e-mail list. How many of us can relate to this?

Dog Rules:

1. The dog is not allowed in the house.
2. Okay, the dog is allowed in the house, but only in certain rooms.
3. The dog is allowed in all rooms, but has to stay off the furniture.
4. The dog can get on the old furniture only.
5. Fine, the dog is allowed on all the furniture, but is not allowed to sleep with the humans on the bed.
6. Okay, the dog is allowed on the bed, but only by invitation.
7. The dog can sleep on the bed whenever he wants, but not under the covers.
8. The dog can sleep under the covers by invitation only.
9. The dog can sleep under the covers every night.
10. The Humans must ask permission to sleep under the covers with the dog.

Another event that I'd like to mention is the demonstration that will be put on by the First in Flight Team out of North Carolina. They originally had a tournament scheduled for May but had to cancel it due to a scheduling error at their facility. They are presently trying to reschedule the tournament for the fourth weekend in Oct. However they will be holding a competitive demonstration at Tanglewood Park, Clemmons, NC on May 10th in the morning before the 30th Annual Steeplechase is run. Watch for them on your TV (due to the fact that there will be 4 TV channels present) or go watch them in person. To all of you that are already competing, good luck in 1997. To all of those that aren't competing yet, you don't know what your missing! Until next time.

Upcoming tournaments are listed from, tournaments, I felt it redundant to list them here again; Up too 3 months worth are listed in The "FF article".

Anyone interested in learning more about FLYBALL competition (the fastest growing dog activity) needs to write to: North American FLYBALL Association, Inc., P.O. Box 8 Mt. Hope, ON L0R 1W0.

Anyone interested in sharing some of their FLYBALL experiences, titles, and upcoming tournaments please write to me at P.O. Box 171 Olin, Iowa 52320-0171 or e-mail Judy Hagan at doublejj@netins.net. To all of you that are already competing, good luck in 1996. To all of those that aren't competing yet, you don't know what your missing!

• Return to the THE "FLYBALL ACTION" COVER PAGE and more articles

Hawkeye Hustlers Team page