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See us next at the Jump Masters Survivor 2010 tournament, September 4-5, 2010 at the Mass Premier Courts in Foxboro, MA.

On August 7-8, 2010, Weston Whirlwinds Lightning attended Fetch 'n Fly's Foto Finish tournament in Henrietta, NY. Fielding just four dogs and three handlers, the team of Torre, Addie, Mattingly, and Remi held it together for an intense weekend of racing, coming in 2nd in the Regular 2 division in an exciting, down-to-the-wire finish that was only decided at the last race of the day. This team had never run together before so the first few races were a little ragged, but after some lineup shuffling that put Torre running start dog for the first time in her career, the team managed a decent first day and an excellent second day of racing, with only two N/F heats out of 18 heats total that day and a fastest time of 20.690. Mattingly earned his FMCh, Remi earned his FDCh-G, and Torre earned her FDCh-S. In addition, Remi was elected to the "Green Team", which was chosen from all the dogs attending that had started racing since October, 2009. Congratulations to the team and to the new title holders!

Weston Whirlwinds owes big Thank You's to Toby from Buffalo Wings, who ran Mattingly (in addition to running his team, his dogs, and judging), to Judy from Moonspinners, who did an excellent job boxloading for the team, to Susan from 2 Fast Fur U for lending us her EZ-up, and to Belinda from Moonspinners and Kathy from 2FFU for calling passes. In addition lots and lots of people helped us with ball shagging. Many thanks to all; we couldn't have done it without you!

On July 31 and August 1, 2010, Weston Whirlwinds co-hosted ARFF's Barkaritaville tournament at the Mass Premiere Courts in Foxboro, MA. In addition to co-hosting, the Whirlwinds fielded three teams - Lightning, with Copper, Coal, Bella, and Torre running in the Regular 2 division, Hurricanes, with Mattingly, Scarlet, Winston, Max, and Rush running in the Multibreed division, and Northern Lights, with Sally (from Flyball MAINEiacs), Caine, Toby, and Jeter running in the Veterans division.

The veterans showed how it's done, running very consistently and taking first place in a really tough Vets division (yes, they even beat Ruff Enuff).

Going into the tournament there was some doubt about how Lightning would perform. This was Torre's first stint running full time, Bella had ripped a pad the previous week, Coal sometimes has separation-from-mom issues, and Copper has been skittish since his collision during the Spring Fling tournament in April. Luckily the dogs held it together and performed very well, even when the boxloading was less than perfect (something about two balls in the box at the same time, or so it has been reported).

The Hurricanes lived up to their name and proved a little tempestuous, having problems with early passes, dropped balls, and exiting the lanes. The high point came at the end of the tournament when Rush came in for Scarlet and had successful runs as start dog - and had fun doing it! But then there was the incident of the disappearing boxloader - perhaps the less said about that the better, although it made for some interesting moments in the lanes.

Congratulations to the dogs who earned new titles:

Rush - FDX
Torre - FDCh
Max - FDCH-Gold
Toby - FMX

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Links

• North American Flyball Association (NAFA®)
• NAFA Region 13 Mailing List
• Flyball Dogs
• Whirlwinds NAFA® Statistics
• Flyball Photos

About Us

The Weston Whirlwinds have been participating in North American Flyball Association flyball tournaments since 2000. We currently have 16 dogs at various levels of competition and training. The mission of the Weston Whirlwinds Flyball Team is above all to have fun with our canine companions while training to be the best we can be and exhibiting good sportsmanship.

About Flyball

Flyball is a relay race for teams of dogs in which each of the four dogs on a team must run down a 51 foot course, jump four hurdles, trigger a "box" which releases a tennis ball, and return back over the hurdles with the ball. Each dog must run in turn and may not cross the start line before the previous dog has returned.

Races occur between pairs of teams running on parallel courses and are electronically timed; sometimes races are decided by as little as one thousandth of a second.

A fast-paced sport open to dogs of all sizes and breeds, Flyball is unique among dog sports in that it is truly a team sport - all the dogs on the team as well as their handlers must work together in order for the team to be successful.

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