Flaming Speedball

I'm changing Dottie's name to Flaming Speedball in the hopes that is improves her agility preformance. Being that she hasn't actually started a lot of agility yet, you know a need for an improvment is not a good thing.

I've always preferred non-agility names for dogs. Names designed to intimidate other competitors (Cobra, El Diablo) or show off how fast your dog is (Zing, Mach) are not my favorite. (I was trying to think of names that do not match up with dogs I know! And it was hard because most of the types of names I've described are taken.) Obviously Pie, Fancy, Dottie, Bloom and Blossom have nothing to do with agility. I like cute names, and also names that make sense when people walking down the street ask me what my dog is named.

Getting back to Flaming Speedball. Desperate times call for desperate measures and I'm willing to make sacrifices to my preferred name if it helps her be faster.

The work I've been doing with Dottie (FSB) are things like tunnel, table, tire, going through jump uprights. We have started agility, but not too much. As of right now, Dottie (FSB) isn't showing much natural ability. She is (dare I say it) sort of slow, unfocused and just uninterested.

Even though I mentioned "sending her away" and tried to dump her off on my brother, I was just teasing. If you buy a dog for agility and it doesn't turn out to be what you hoped, and you find it a great home, that is your choice. But in my mind rescue dogs are different. They can be great performance dogs, but because you are taking a chance, all rescue dogs need to be pets first and performance dogs second. So if you get a rescue and it doesn't turn out to be a star in your chosen sport, placing the dog is not an option. If you want to be a star that badly, you should buy a dog. Therefore, have no fear, Dottie (FSB) is not going anywhere. Because she is my pet, and I don't get rid of pets.

I have not given up on Dottie's (FSB) agility career. I have a very knowledgeable friend helping me. I have made some changes in our life style and already see an improvement. Dottie (FSB) has always had unlimited access to the other dogs. Now I see she finds them more rewarding than she finds me. (Gee, how did that happen? She gets to bite them and play with them and they don't make her do anything.) Now she is separate from them and I am her main playmate. Also, I play fetch with Fancy and Pie, then put them away and play fetch with her. We've been working on retrieving since she is a baby and she has never been that excited about it. She never retrieved the ball in the group since she was too busy chasing Fancy. Now she doesn't have Fancy to obsess over and because of that she is more excited about the ball. The next part is the part of the "Ruff Love" program that I will fade the quickest because it is the least fun. Dottie (FSB) is in her crate unless she is working or playing with me. That way when she comes out she is excited to spend time with me, instead of me taking her away from other fun things she was doing (such as getting into the trash can) and making her do "boring" work.

I've stopped using food in agility training because she can't go quickly and eat at the same time and when the food comes out she thinks so much about the food she can't think about going fast. I've also stopped using the tug as a reward because it has too many rules attached and can't be that fun. She has to tug well, hold calmly and release on command with no mouthing. Agility needs more spontaneity and the tug is tied so closely with the control of SchH that I can't do both correctly.

With out food and the tug, what is left? The last few times I've been letting her jump on me and mouth me and chase me as her reward. The old "you should be the most exciting thing in your dog's life" idea. When when we play this rough, I am super exciting. But it is tiring and both of us are only good for a short training session that way.

And something else that was pointed out to me that has helped increase speed to the bowl and ball is using larger distances. She does start to decelerate as she gets close to a bowl with food in it or a placed toy, so she needs to be far enough away that she can get up to full speed before she begins to decelerate.

The good news is already I've seen an improvement. FSB was going faster. Not Border Collie fast and probably not even as fast as she can go, but much better than she was doing. If I could get this much improvement out of her in a week, maybe we can keep improving.

One more thing some supporters have pointed out is it is possible she will mature and get more into it and faster. I have since heard of a few dogs who have matured along these lines so that can give us hope also.

But wouldn't it be so much easier if just changing her name "fixed" everything? Therefore, everyone should now refer to Dottie as Flaming Speedball.