New titles in the family!

Mom is the guest blogger for this post...I was too sick to pay much attention to anything this past weekend. (I'm fine now!)~SDS

Score earned his FD (Flyball Dog-20 points), FDX (Flyball Dog Excellent-100 points) and FDCh (Flyball Dog Champion-500 points) titles this weekend. He's now officially Herart's Makin' Trax FDCh.

Yea! Okay, here are the gory details (well, not gory, but gross)

Score was on the same team as Sawyer...I figured if Score was doing well, I'd pull Sawyer instead of pulling someone else's dog for my green (inexperienced) pup.

We did single dog racing on Friday night. We got out there, and did a recall. Score comes tearing to me! Then we do a few warm-up runs...he does fantastic...hits the box high, whips off and comes to me. Then we line up to run the actual races. (five races against one other dog in the other lane. We false start the first one, so he's ahead of the other dog (a big fluffy samoyed). I hold back so he's not false starting on the second run. The second run, he sees the dog going out, and stops and looks at me. "I can't go, there's a dog over there, and you're gonna yell at me!" The other dog comes back, he runs and does fine. Third race, same thing. So for the last two, I just let him false start (no times, but at least he succeeded!). His times...4.6, 4.8. We go celebrate that night...Peach Flips and Jell-O shots...

I'm still not really planning on running him a lot...just some warm-ups, maybe a few runs if Sawyer is tired. This is more just practice for him...I don't think he's truly ready yet.

Flash forward to Saturday morning. (me with a headache) Sawyer goes out with me and the others to potty that morning at the motel. He won't go. I take him back in, and tell John that he hasn't gone yet. John takes him into the building at the site, and I take him later and put him in his crate. Forgetting that he didn't potty earlier, neither one of us potties him again. A while later, we're all in the crating area trying to figure out what smells. The puppy is fine, everyone is fine...but Sawyer, who has done the poop dance in his crate. Smeared it everywhere.

We run Sawyer in the first race, and he's spitting out treats and not acting like himself. I tell my teammates that I'm gonna bring Score out for the next race in case Sawyer needs relief. Sawyer proceeds to have diarrhea in his car crate during the wait. (shoving the old throw-away blanket out of the way to poop directly on the crate pan).

Next race out, we bring Score out...and Sawyer. A teammate holds Sawyer on the sidelines, while I warm up Score. He does beautifully in the warm-ups...so I put him on the line-up. He runs with a bit of hesitation...checking out the small toy poodle in the other lane. The boxloader reported that he was keeping one eye on the other dog. He runs two really well, and then the third race...he decides to cross over to say hi to that cute little poodle. We lose that one, and Sawyer comes in. (and proceeds to run okay...only okay)

The next race out, I try him again...we go in and run well for the first two, and lose the third because Score gets excited and craps in the lane. Yes, my day was really crappy. Sawyer then has liquid poo in his crate, and lays in it. He gets hosed off twice in one day.

By the end of Saturday, he was looking good, and we were taking Sawyer out on the lanes too, just in case. We go to our motel that night, he crashes on the bed, while the humans all meet in a teammate's room for Peach Flips (yes, we came with a blender)...jell-o shots and vodka shots.

Sunday...gonna be a good day, no headache, no diarrhea from Sawyer.

Score goes in the lane first race, and just does wonderful. No pooping, no crossing...the report from the boxloader is that he's looking at the other dog, but more to gauge where they are. He's racing! His best time for the weekend? 4.6...but he mananges a couple of 4.7s, 4.8s and the like. Nothing much over 5, once he hit his stride. I was slowly backing him up (starting at 10-15 feet)...to give him room to get up to speed. Passes were still a bit wide 4-5 feet...so he's just gonna get faster.

His box turn? High, fast and tight. Beautiful...he actually kicked his boxloader in the crotch at one time...turning off that box. Kept it high all weekend...kicked some ass with that turn.

So it all worked out perfectly, Score got to run and earn titles, Sawyer got to sit out and be sick (lovely)...and everyone was happy. Oh yeah, and I kept asking the photographer...to see if he could get some pics. He was always up racing when we were up. *pout* But by the end of the weekend, he came up and told me that he did manage to get some of Score...so I had to give him a big hug...I was so happy! Once they go up on his site, I'll be sharing them!

TheRedQueen aka Service Dog Sawyer's Mom