Another flyball discussion....

[Liesje]

A few weeks ago at training one of my team mates said that she feels a dog should have experience being run by different people and that the team should be able to basically run dogs interchangeably. The discussion came about because this person has three dogs trained in flyball and obviously can only run one of them at a time during tournaments. I was just wondering what other people thought about this, especially from a GSD point of view. I know that Nikon would only run for Phil or Falon (and would probably only run for Falon if I was also in the ring and only run for Phil if I was totally out of the picture). I don't really see any value in allowing other people to run my dog either in practice or at tournaments, but I know I've always been pretty guarded with my dogs and want everything we achieve to be as a team (I handle him myself in conformation, don't let other people line-handle him at SchH, etc).

[harmony]

I sure do miss four shepherds. I really do not know, but a horse has one jocky, a good jocky can handle any horse

[Shade]

Not a flyball person but I would personally say no, I do everything with my dog myself and I don't like other people getting too involved. I worked very hard to get my dog to the place he is in training and there are very few if any people that I would trust doing anything with him. I don't see any real benefit to it either, if your dog is running you're going to be there regardless so why would you NEED to train him to allow multiple people to run him

I don't see why it would be a issue to say you disagree, you could offer to help others to maybe unruffle some feathers if that's what the club decides to do but allowing another person to run your dog just because they ask you to should be up to you and they should respect your decision either way

JMO

[MilesNY]

For me this depends on the dog. My shepherd, no I most likely would not have someone else handle him in anything. Under very special circumstances would I alter this but not for something like flyball. My border collie, I will let anyone handle. He is a different sort of dog so it isn't as much of an issue.

[onyx'girl]

Isn't flyball a 'team sport'? I guess I could see the reason for others to handle the team dogs.
In other sports, however, usually the team consists just of the dog and handler....and handler should be the only one to handle.

[Cassidy's Mom]

I think that should be entirely up to you. If you're not comfortable with the idea for whatever reason, I don't think you should be pressured to do it. If her dogs will run for anyone, great. Since you're only racing one dog right now anyway, the only reason someone might need to run him for you is if you got injured at a tournament and there weren't enough extra dogs to just pull him. That did actually happen to one of our teammates, she fell in the ring and sprained her ankle. She spent the rest of the day laying in the crating area with her foot elevated on a chair and a bag of ice taped to it, but we just had other people run her dogs. One of them is recovering from an injury that occurred outside of flyball, but shortly after he started racing. He's back in training now, and when he's ready to race again he'll be handled by Mollie's roommate Carrie, who doesn't even have a dog. Michelle refers to Carrie as Rico's "flyball mom", lol. Carrie also runs Jinx for our co-captain, who has a gazillion dogs and can't possibly race them all herself.

We all handle each other's dogs extensively at practice in terms of restraining them, but I've never actually raced any of our other dogs and nobody else has raced Halo. I don't think it would be an issue, even if I were there, I think she'd run for anyone who had her beloved Orbee tug. She goes batcrap crazy if she sees Tom (he has to hide if he comes to watch her race!) and would almost certainly go to him instead of to the box, but I could probably be right there in the ring and she'd still do her job. I'd just want to coach the person first, so they know to hold on tight because she lunges forward when the race starts, and that she hits the tug hard and doesn't always like to let go.

[NateD]

I think if a dog will run for someone else then great, but to expect it or require it of the members of the team absolutely not.

My dog can be goofy to handle. She is not forgiving of poor reward presentations and the scars on my knuckles prove that. She also isn't coming back just for the toy, she is coming back for the game of tug with ME, I can't imagine she'll be as quick for others as she'd be for me.

[KristiM]

Ya its kinda nice to have dogs that will run for other people. I have been running a team mate's jack and I LOVE it, all the fun and none of the other stuff that goes with having a bunch of dogs haha. The easy way to avoid HAVING to have other people run your dog is to not get more than you can handle

From a GSD point of view NO ONE would EVER be able to run either of my dogs. Odin just wouldn't do it and Havoc gets super pissy about other people handling him (I don't even do restrained recalls with him.) Both of my boys are also very mouthy (ya so far have been bit a lot when they are super jacked), big, hard to handle and very unforgiving if you don't handle them properly (bad tug presentations etc). I would be way too concerned about my dog injuring someone or the dog getting injured while someone else is handling them.

From my point of view WTH is the point if someone else is running my dog???

[Cassidy's Mom]

Originally Posted by onyx'girl

Isn't flyball a 'team sport'? I guess I could see the reason for others to handle the team dogs.
In other sports, however, usually the team consists just of the dog and handler....and handler should be the only one to handle.

Yeah, flyball is definitely different that way, it's not at all unusual for people to be running other people's dogs. Three of my teammates went to a tournament last weekend, and it takes 5 people to race - one handler for each dog, and a boxloader, so people from other clubs filled in.

There's one club in Southern California that always seems to show up to tournaments with just 3 or 4 people, and our club has helped them out numerous times. I've boxloaded for them, and other people in my club raced some of their dogs, so it's not just people in the same club that might step in to help.

But still, I don't think anyone should HAVE to let other people run their dog if they don't want to.

[Andaka]

I don't do flyball -- yet -- but Jag does agility. I can't run that far for health reasons, but I trained him to do all of the obstacles, and I can run short sequences, but for him to progress, and he loves agility, he is running for our instructor. I agree that it can work, but it shouldn't b required.