hi what times (one there own ) have your dogs runin flyball

jane

Jet's all time PB over full height is 4.29s...generally though she does about 4.4-4.5s.

The world record holder is Moose the whippet from Spring loaded at 3.59 for NAFA (USA Organisation) and for UFLI (the other USA organisation), it's Jack-Jack (also a whippet) 3.626. Go the whippets!!

In the UK, you don't see many dogs running under4s, and those that do are regarded as some of the fastest in the country.

Times obviously vary on the size of the dog etc, but there are some cracking height dogs out there now running very low 4s/sub 4, main two examples being Lizzy from Bassets, Dodgy from Shooting Stars. :D

Will shut up now lol!

Cai's best recorded time is 4.2 seconds but he normally runs around 4.5 - 4.8 seconds in the winter. I cant wait for summer as he is much fitter then and im hoping to get him sub 4 seconds but the end of the season runningdog

ohh very quick times were are not as quick had not thought of being slower in winter are they quicker outdoors than indoors i only started competing in Oct so am very new

jane

A lot of it depends on the dog! We have a spaniel that runs 5.5-6.0s in our 4th team when she's outdoors, when she gets inside she's 5.0-5.3s. However then we have dogs of the other extreme who slow down dramatically.

On the whole, I would say that times are generally slower indoors, but I think it's just because the surface is different to what they are used to. All the world records and scary-fast US teams race indoors, so it can be done. A lot of the fast dogs have been known to burn their pads whilst running indoors, we have people at our club refuse to run on matting.

I also think that stamina and fitness probably comes into it. In the winter, teams generally compete about once a month. However in Summer, if you wanted to (especially up here where Owlers and West Riding are) you could compete every single weekend. We don't tend to do that, more like 2/3 a month, but it really gets them racing fit. The fastest times on the BFA standings seem to peak around July/August.

Hope this helps a bit.... :D

There is a young lady from the Bristol Ballistics whose dog is without doubt the fastest I have ever seen. I have box judged their team a few times and it is simply awesome to watch. Her dog is quite tall (collie) and she seems to keep the body flat across the whole distance and just touch the legs down when needed. The box turn is in the blink of an eye. Wish I knew what times her dog runs at.

I reckon you must mean Nat with Asher - a very pretty smooth coated tri merle. I think she runs under 4 seconds...

Yes, that sounds like her!

Lol Nat wouldnt be happy calling Asher a girl, hehe!

I've trained em in agility - so fast its scary!!!

Whoops, I really should know better - people always do that to mine and he is a smooth tri merle too! (Not as fast as Asher though runningdog )

I have read this post with great interest. As a very new newcomer to Flyball, (Tizzy has had one training session and is now in season , grrr), I am just amazed at these times.
Me thinks there is going to be a lot more training than I thought, at least Tizzy has the enthusiasm if nothing else yet.

Asher is an amazing dog, he is just so keen and is a sub 4 second dog. He was with my Badger in pairs at the British Championships which they won with 8.25sec. Badger usually clocks around 4.1 over full height but last summer he was recorded doing a 3.94 second over 14. Dooley doesn't really have the Flyball drive but he still enjoys it. He just likes to do it in his own time, but hey that's Dooley I wouldn't want him any other way. His personal best was 5.46 seconds lol

Lol that does sound like the amazing Asher :D He's one awesome dog...can't wait until he takes on the agility world!

I think he did 3.86s in a singles comp? Not sure what height though. runningdog

Hiya, I've just joined and come across this topic so wanted to thank you for your kind comments about my Asher :D :wub:

Hello all.

I see all these dogs with mega fast times and I wonder how long it took before they got that fast or were they always that fast?
I have two, one only been open for a couple of months and the other still in starters. The open one is getting around 5 seconds now, started off at 5 and a halfish a couple of months ago and isn't too bad on the box...and she's 20 months old. She only ran one starters comp indoors in January and was unable to run anymore due to paw injuries, season, lack of starter dogs in our club and tournaments for starters etc...
The other one is faster over the hurdles but crap on the box which I am trying to work on. I know she clocked a 4.9 in the have a go at dogs unleashed in July and she's about to turn 18 months. If she had a better turn, no doubt that would shave quite a bit of time off that.

My bitch that i run Belle has been clocked at her fastest over full height at 4.31 secs, she is quite a small dog so i suspect she might perform better over a slightly lower height.

My partner runs our other dog Dylan and his best over full height is 4.26secs but is consistantly at around the 4.3 - 4.4 mark.

Belle has been doing flyball for 18 months now, although 8 - 10 months of that was on the crufts box, BFA wise she's only been doing properly since Feb this year.

Dylan hasn't ever done crufts flyball but we only had home sept and was out of netting at his second training session and i think has allot more to give, when not racing another dog in singles at 7'' we've had him timed at 4.18 but he may still go faster.

Belle also in singles over 7'' has done a 4.25 so maybe they would benefit from a height dog. Their turns aren't brilliant but we are looking to maybe swap to a canadian box as i think this suits there natural turn more than a bomerang.

xxx :D

Flash did a 4.03s at dundee this month and breeze did a 4.22s!

As a pup I didn't think Asher would be super quick, really just because he didn't seem terribly fast across the ground, think it took him a while to work out how to use his legs and actually accelerate lol! Once he started flyball training, we did lots of runbacks over low jumps which really built his drive and helped his striding so he got faster. I also did lots of boxwork as the boxturn is really important to me, not just for safety but for quicker times and helping the dog maintain the speed on the way back. At 15months in starters (1st comp) he was probably doing 4.3secs (running from 20ft as didn't want to ruin his box), At 17months (2nd starters) he was about 4.1secs running from 30ft. Then he decided he was going to change the way he turned on the box *nightmare* headwallbash so he went in to open with his box still being retrained, in hindsight I probably should have pulled him out to retrain but he was still turning ok so I've put in a lot of work between competitions and he's pretty good now! He's been in open a year and a half now, over full height he's generally between 4-4.1secs with the odd sub 4. Over his current jump height of 10" he is generally pretty consistently 3.8-3.9secs. runningdog

When it comes to the box, a problem I see a lot in mine and other peoples dogs is where they turn ok when you're box training them but then it goes to pot when they do a full run or in competition...say if you use props to make them turn properly in training but then not in competition so they revert to doing a two or three paws instead of 4.

I can have one of mine doing 4 paw turns with a ball without any props when just box training her but in competitions and full runs, she reverts to three paws although sometimes the 4th is just on the bottom edge of the box.

I have (and have seen) the same problems, I think the key is just repetition. Firstly you need to build them up to doing a full run at training with the props in, including being able to run them as part of a team and them still maintaining the box turn. Once they can do that, try the odd one at training with no props to check they still do it. Then when you go to competitions, always do the warm up with the props in to reinforce the turn before you race. I found this helped alot as we switched from boomerang to canam box over last winter. I plan on doing every single training session over this winter with the props in to build muscle memory and hopefully he'll come out with a perfect turn next year! Also plan on doing lots of speed exercises to see if I can get him any faster!

Thanks for that. We will be switching from Canadians to combi boxes soon. I'm hoping Wren gets on better with the Combis.

One thing I notice about Wren is that she often doesn't seem to know what to do with her back feet and they can swing round the side of the box when props are there rather than going on it to push herself off.
She does vaults (Like a swimmers turn) on my body and back end awareness tricks so she knows her back feet are there. I hope the vaults which is a more recent trick will help reinforce muscle memory for a swimmers turn like movement...she loves doing them anyway.
She also tries to stick to the box for too long and slips down the front of it even though she comes back quickly for her tuggy once she is off, it's like she needs a second or so to make sure she properly has the ball and is prone to fumbling. I suppose she just needs more practise.

Just out of interest, why are you switching to the combi boxes?

I'm guessing that her back feet only miss the box when you are doing a turn with the ball in? If this is the case, everytime she does a rubbish turn do a few turns with no ball to remind her of where her feet should be then put the ball in for one turn and see how it is. Try building it up like this until the number of turns you need to do without a ball decreases.

With speed off the box, one really good exercise I would recommend is to start by having a box and one jump. Have someone hold her behind the jump. You stand by the box. As she approaches the box you run away from the box past her, hopefully she will still go and do her box turn and get the ball (keep the props in) but in her mind she will just be wanting to catch you up so should drive off the box pretty quickly. You can gradually build this up to a full run so that as she crosses the start gate you start running back from the box end. Certainly gives you a work out aswell!!

I'm not 100% sure about the switch over...I think they were hoping these would be better than our current ones. Do you have any opinions about the combis?

We have a dog at our club who does a lovely turn over and over with no ball but will not turn no matter what props are used when a ball is in the box. It's like he views them as two completely seperate exercises. If you put a slat in, he keeps his back legs on the other side of it and still does two paws...you can move it back and he still manages....or if he's forced to bring them over, still won't put them on the box...nothing seems to have made him do a turn when there's a ball in the box and they had to pull him from racing because of the risk of injury. I was worried about mine learning the same thing.

Sleet will do great turns with the ball in when training at home etc...to be honest, I didn't really teach them to turn with no ball so it's not the ball being there or not being there, it's doing the full run with hurdles and all that seems to cause her to put one foot on the ground.
Wrens just rubbish at turning...without a ball there, she doesn't see the point in even showing the box any attention though. I've been gradually getting the message across at home using clicker training method but using the word 'yes' in place of a clicker...she only gets a yes and the tuggy if she gets all paws on the slantboard...otherwise, she gets nowt, lol. I think she started to cotton on.

I have heard about the other exercise....just got to convince them to let me try it at training.

I don't have any particularly strong views on the combi, safety wise i'm sure it's fine but i wouldn't imagine it would produce fast turns and I know teams who have used it and changed to proper canams because of that and the fact the dogs were sticking to the rubber. But I've never used one so can't speak from experience!

It sounds like you are making progress with Wren and I reckon if you can convince you're team to try that exercise with Sleet it will really help her. It sounds like she's just not transferring her body weight very well and is more thinking about getting on the box than about how she's gonna get back off it!

With that other dog in your team (if it's still training!) I would have someone stood infront of the box between the prop and the box. Dog on lead and walk it around the turn, then walk it around the turn and give it the ball as it coming back off the box. Give the ball, closer and closer to the box until it is by the hole. Once the ball is in the hole, give same command as if there was no ball there but keep person there so that the dog has no other option than to go around the person and get the ball. make sure it cannot come back off the way it went on to the box. For a while the turn will not be pretty and it will not be quick but the dog will eventually realise that it needs to put its back feet on the box aswell. Once it does this the person can gradually back away from the box. (We've had a couple of dogs with the same problem and this worked really well for one of them, the other one is still in training but at the last session got all 4 feet on the box with me about 2 feet away so it is working for her too!)

Thanks for all that.

Recently, our team captain has been standing in front of the box to try and make the dogs turn...he stands slightly to one side to encourage them on at the correct side then steps forward once they're on so they have to come off on the other side. Some of the dogs like Wren seemed ok with it after a couple of tries but my sisters older dog who usually does 3 paws these days was really messy with it and hurt a back leg slightly along with serious ball fumbles. He started running out on his way back which he NEVER EVER does so she had to rest him for the rest of that training session.

Hmmm....I'm not sure what our team captain would reckon now if these combis cause the same issues for us as the other teams you know, haha. He has tried a couple of our teams dogs on another teams combi and said they seemed fine with them after a few tries. Boxes in general don't come cheap do they? I heard at the summer champs during div 1, somebody saying that all the fastest teams seem to use Canadians....one team had loads of white tape stuck in a thick band near the base of the box...so much that it actually stuck out and was raised up compared to the surface of the box. Would that be there to aid the dogs turn in anyway? I saw some fabulous turns from some of those dogs...I can only wish mine get turns like that someday.

Yes a lot of the Div 1 teams do use the canadian boxes but not all. The Shooting stars use bomerangs and have always done so and to be honest dont really do much box work (well they didnt when i trained with them 2 years ago) and they still get some great times so sometimes its just down to having the right dogs racing together at the right time.

The white tape is usually there to make the dogs think they have a jump or prop infront of the box so that they jump higher into the box hopefully getting a better swimmers turn... ive seen it work well and ive seen dogs ignore it so again i dont think what works for one always works for all dogs.

Hmm, it is worth mentioning then if it can help some dogs even if not all of them. I'll tell my team captain about that one.

Many thanks for the information:) Wren is running tomorrow in a NFC team at sutton fields..to experience open racing for the first time so mainly just an experience thing than anything else...I'm not sure what box we'll be using as two dogs from other teams are also making up this team.

With the walking in on the dog, I really wouldn't try to start this with the dog doing a full run, it needs to be built up with just starting with the box and then adding jumps, preferably with wings in to remind the dog that they still have to do them!

We have white tape around the base of our box as our young dogs were taught with a jump infront of the box so as has been previously said we are trying to create the illusion of the prop still being there. It seems to help with Asher as our box has been sent back for repair we have been borrowing a few different canams recently and he seems to turn better on those with white tape on.

I could go on about boxwork all day and what does and doesn't constitute a good turn. For example its a common misconception that 4 feet on the box automatically makes it a good turn. Keep an eye on my blog over winter as i'll go in to more detail and I'll be keeping track of our new starters training and trying to make our more experienced dogs better! Retraining box turns is a bitch by the way, it really is best to get it right from the start!!

This is Asher on the box:


Good luck with Wren :D

.

:wub: Awwh my favourite Asher!

Completely agree with Nat about turns (...and I could also go on about them all day, and we do :lol:)

We use white tape on our box, and it works quite well for our dogs - especially those in the first and second teams.

waggingd

Well, we're back from Sutton fields. Wren was a little slow and sluggish today but i've not been great today either and I'm sure the dogs picked up on it plus it was hot and wren is quite affected by the heat. They did use a Canadian but I couldn't really see what she was doing on it. I know it wasn't 4 paw turns put it that way...boohoo. She does them fine at home now....GAH!!!! She still seems to stick to the box too long though.

Jayjay's fastest recorded time so far, after doing flyball for about 10 weeks is 4.75secs. *doggiehug*