Flyball Training Manual

I will be posting my complete training manual over the coming weeks and will have links to each of my post on this page. If you have read my “About Us” page you know that I’ve been playing and training Flyball since the fall of 1999. I don’t claim the have all of the answers and I am still learning. I don’t think there is anyone out there that has all of the answers. Each dog is an individual just like people are so each brings their own special challenge.

I have attended Flyball training seminars and talked with numerous Flyball trainers from many regions, and have watched and trained my own dogs and other people’s dogs. I have used many different methods some have been successful while others have not. This manual includes the training methods that have worked for me and they are the ones that I use to train puppies and older dogs the game of Flyball. I invite you to participate and comment about anything that I have written in this manual so that we may all learn through everyone’s experience.

Table of Contents:

Training Goals
Laying a Good Foundation
Lessons 1
Lessons 2
Lessons 3
Lessons 4
Lessons 5
Lessons 6
Correcting Problems – This is the problems solving and troubleshooting section.
1. Catching the Ball
2. Bobbling and Box Problems
3. Jumping and Jump Problems
In the Ring – This section will help you in the ring. I have not seen very much written anywhere about this but it is very important to know.
1. Traffic Flow
2. Starts and Passing - Starting and passing are really the only things that you have control over. If you are giving away seconds because of poor starts and passes you might as well forfeit the race. You can only get so much speed out of your dog so why add to their time by a bad start or late pass? Your timing will make a big difference to the final time and can mean the difference between winning and losing.
  - Starts
  - Passing
3. Boxloading Do’s and Don’ts
4. Re-Runs
Team Guide
Other Information - There many other good sources of information on the Internet about flyball training. Here are some links you can follow to other sources:
1. The Sure Shot Flyball Blog - The Sure Shot Flyball Blog is an excellent source for flyball training information. Here are just a few that I have found helpful:
  - Retraining: Fact or Fiction - This is any excellent article which discusses retraining issues in some depth.
  - Warm-Up Dogs - Warming up dog in the ring exposes green dogs to new situations that cannot be re-created in practice.
  - Distraction Work with Puppies - Great article for things you should do with your new flyball dog puppy.
  - Now where does that gutter go? - A must read on guiding your dog to a perfect box turn.
2. Let’em Win! - This article is on Chris VanWert’s blog site about puppy training and flyball.