The basicsFlyball was first developed in the 1970s by Herbert Wagner, who engineered the first flyball box for his ball mad dog. After taking the sport on the Johnny Carson show, it exploded in popularity to become one of the fastest growing dog sports in the world.
There are very few dog sports that are more exciting to watch or compete in than flyball. It's one of the only team dog sports around and because there are so many dogs, and people in the ring, it is also one of the loudest sports around. The dogs know their job when they walk into the ring and they will work each other up, so it's very common for teams of dogs to start barking before they even get into the ring. Flyball is a relay race, between two teams of four dogs. Two runs, including starting gates, 4 jumps and a flyball box are set up side by side. Dogs from each team have to go over the jumps, trigger the box that releases a ball, catch that ball and return over all four jumps, carrying the ball to a start/finish gate where the next dog waits. Each team consists of four running dogs, racing in each heat plus two up to two reserve dogs that can be interchanged between heats. There are between three and five heats per race depending on the racing format - either best of 5 or 3 heat racing. All dogs, regardless of breed, size or speed, can compete and jump heights are set based on the ulna (bottom bone of the front leg) length of the smallest dog on the team. |
Speed
To keep flyball racing "fair" for all dogs that compete, teams are divided into divisions based on their seed time. Seed times tell the competition organisers how fast that team can run at its fastest. To make sure that teams don't put in a slower seed time than they should, there are penalties for teams that run too fast for the division that they are in. If teams run too fast, they will "break out", and automatically lose the heat, even if the other team needs to re-run dogs and are significantly slower. On top of this, there are also penalties for "sandbagging", or putting in large gaps between racing dogs and forcing the dogs to appear to be going significantly slower than they really can.
Ring Set upFlyball rings are always set up to a uniform standard so dogs can race anywhere without issues. Given that the sport originated in America, measurements are done in feet and inches. There are 10 feet between jumps, and 15 feet between the last jump and the flyball box so dogs learn muscle memory for the sport.
Each run has start/finish gates which trigger the timing system to check for early starts, early passes and breakouts with a set of drag lights between. The timing lights also allow teams to run handicapped (so one team starts before the other) when required for different reasons. |
the Swimmers turnOne of the most important aspects of training a dog to compete in flyball is the swimmer's turn. Named for the action that swimmers do when they turn at the end of the lane, the swimmer's turn is the fastest and safest way for a dog to turn on the box. The swimmer's turn should start with the dog jumping high onto the box with the front feet, grabbing the ball as it shoots out of the box, then bringing it's back feet onto the box as high as it's front feet landed, before pushing off back towards the jumps.
|
Title points and titles
Titles are awarded by the Australian Flyball Association according to the number of points a dog has earned. These titles are given abbreviations that are added to the end of the dog's name as a way to immortalise their achievements. To gain one title point, a dog must run on a team where all 4 dogs successfully complete a clean run. If the team runs clean and wins the heat, the dogs are awarded an extra point each. If the team does not run cleanly the first time and has to re-run at least one of their dogs, no title points are awarded, even if the team wins the heat.
Gaining 5 points will earn the dog the title of Flyball Dog (FD), 20 points earns the title of Flyball Dog Excellent (FDX). Flyball Dog Champion (FDCH) is awarded at 50 points, Australian Flyball Champion (AFCh) at 150 points, Flyball Master (FM) at 400 points, Flyball Master Excellent (FMX) at 700 points, Flyball Master Champion (FMCh) at 1000 points, ONYX (named after the first dog to achieve the title) at 1300 points, Flyball Dog Grand Champion (FDGCh) at 2000 points, Jeddah (again, named after the first dog to achieve the title) at 3000 points and Ezri at 4000 points.
For ANKC registered dogs owned by a member of a state canine control body (in NSW, this is Dogs NSW), these titles can also be recognised on the dog's pedigree.
Gaining 5 points will earn the dog the title of Flyball Dog (FD), 20 points earns the title of Flyball Dog Excellent (FDX). Flyball Dog Champion (FDCH) is awarded at 50 points, Australian Flyball Champion (AFCh) at 150 points, Flyball Master (FM) at 400 points, Flyball Master Excellent (FMX) at 700 points, Flyball Master Champion (FMCh) at 1000 points, ONYX (named after the first dog to achieve the title) at 1300 points, Flyball Dog Grand Champion (FDGCh) at 2000 points, Jeddah (again, named after the first dog to achieve the title) at 3000 points and Ezri at 4000 points.
For ANKC registered dogs owned by a member of a state canine control body (in NSW, this is Dogs NSW), these titles can also be recognised on the dog's pedigree.
People in the ringThere are always a lot of people in the flyball ring. On top of the handlers of the racing dogs, there may also be the handlers of the 1-2 other dogs on the team who aren't racing as well as the team captain, ball shagger (the person who picks up the balls so handlers and dogs don't trip on them), the box loader (who loads the flyball box), and possibly a pass caller (who tells handlers how big the space was between dogs so handlers can try to get the dogs to run nose to nose on the line).
There are also officials in the ring - the judge and 4 stewards who act as the judge's eyes on the little details of the dogs running. While the judge oversees the main running of the ring and all decisions that are made, the 4 stewards include 2 line stewards and 2 box stewards. The two line stewards look for early starts, early passes, any sandbagging and make sure that the dog goes over the first two jumps and brings the ball back over the same two jumps on it's way back. The box stewards check that the dog jumps the 3rd and 4th jumps, triggers the flyball box and then brings the ball back over the same jumps. |