Barkin in Bonham 3.5

The first tournament of the year is in the books! Although Zio can do better, he was much improved over the first tournament last year. His best time from the weekend was a 4.08, but he ran Sunday with a burned pad that had to be wrapped before each race. His turns reverted back to three legs most of the time, so that's what we'll concentrate on in practice until the next tournament in March.

He was actually very consistent with his starts. For almost the entire weekend, I had to line him up around 61' 11" to avoid early starts. Only during the very last races Sunday did I have to adjust that (to 61' 6") as he ran a little slower.

His platelet count came back solidly in the normal (200k-300k) range at 257k! This is after being completely weened from Prednisone for the last two weeks! The highest he had tested since he was diagnosed with Erhlicha at the beginning of November was 201k the beginning of December after the initial higher dosages of Prednisone.

Another Fun Practice

We took a new picture of everyone so that we can update the webpage and it made me realize how far we've come in the last year. We have so many fun people coming and it's exciting to see the dogs progress. Of course, I'm plotting which dogs have the potential to be on the club team and we have a lot of dogs in that category.

With the first tournament of 2012 less than three weeks away, I'm very excited to see some of the new dogs and handlers get in the ring! First time handlers Amanda with Jasmine and John with Lucy and Lucky. Maverick is going to make his debut in pre-flight singles and the pairs on Sunday.

I was hoping to have Luna ready for pre-flight at this tournament, but it will end up being the March or May tournament now. Zio did well at practice using the regular eight inch jumpboard. We'll do some practice tonight in the backyard "ring". When the tournament comes around, he'll have been off of the prednisone for about two weeks, so I'm hoping he'll be feeling good! It would be nice to turn some more 3.9's!

Another Blood Sample

Zio went in for another blood test today to check his platelet levels. At the beginning of November when he was diagnosed with Erhlichia, they were 145k (200k - 300k is considered normal). After two weeks on antibiotics, they had only slightly improved to 150k. He was started on 20mg of Prednisone, twice a day for five days and then once a day for five more days and rechecked in the beginning of December. At that time, they had improved to 201k. Toward the end of December, he was being weaned from the Prednisone and had been taken one every other day for most of the month. Before Christmas, he tested at 184k, so he has continued on the every other day, 20mg dosage to date.

Really hoping for good news today...*sigh*

EDIT: Platelet count at 197k, so she wants him to take one a week for two weeks, then test again after another two weeks.

It's not flyball unless there is some blood!

Usually, that means the handler. Zio broke a nail toward the end of practice, so that pretty much ended his day. Fortunately, it was just the nail and not a tear. Thanks to my teammates that cleaned up every spot he stepped until I noticed he was bleeding.

Prior to that, he was back on track with his turns and did great keeping everything nice and high. On the drive home, I was reflecting on where we were a year ago in his training. Back then, he was still doing okay in practice, but would fall apart in a tournament... stabbing the box, turning the wrong way, three legged turns, etc...

A year later and I'm very proud (usually) of how he runs. I'm really looking forward to the first tournament in less than four weeks now!

Hmmm...

Not sure what was going on yesterday, but he suddenly decided he didn't need to go above the jump board laying against the pedal. I put a regular jump board in and he crashed it a couple of times, but started getting back up again. Maybe he was just being lazy. I'll have to keep an eye on that and maybe throw in some backyard practice this week... after it warms up!

Steady

We've been able to get out a few times a week and squeeze in some extra practices with our warmer weather. Zio has been fairly consistent with his turns, so I've been very happy with the little man. The only prop continues to be the 10" jumpboard laying flat against the box pedal. He tends to slip if he gets too low, so it has been very effective at keeping him up on the box with minimal visual cues.

He continues on one tablet of 20mg Prednisone every other day. He would have been done with them around the end of last month, but his platelet count from 12/22 had dropped to 184K (from 201K) since the beginning of December. Normal is considered 200K-300K. He'll be due another follow up blood test in a week or two. Another vet mentioned that she has a dog with ehrilichia too and she puts her dog through a round of Doxy every quarter. I'll have to discuss that with Dr. Morey when I take him in again.

2011 in Review

We've been fairly limited on backyard practicing because
a) it gets dark early,
b) it's been rainy and wet
c) it's been too cold (for me!)

Sunday practices have been pretty good. I know some of the newer people think Zio really has his act together, but it's only been ten short months since our first tournament in February where his turns just imploded. You would never have guessed we had worked on anything over the winter. Fast forward to today and he is light years ahead of where we were then, mainly due to a tip from Trish Keck. She suggested that we use the gutter parallel with the lane to push him over in the lane away from the ball. We used that or a modified version of it for months and it has really made it click for him.

I predicted early in the year that Zio could hit a 3.9 with his new turn and he did it the first time in April (3.987) and with an official singles time of 3.953 in May. I also predicted that we would break into the 17's as a team and we did that in April (17.804) at the qualifiers. We ended the year with a club best time of 17.753 set during championship weekend with Zio, Cody, Wisp, and Jean-Luc.

My little man continues to be the poster child for tugging at practices. I sort of like it when people look at him and think he's a finished product, because I feel like I'll always be working on one thing or another... especially his turns.

It has definitely been an eventful year. Starting out as the new team captain, all of the veteran's efforts in getting newcomers involved, and even a new logo for our fresh start has made a big difference. Our practices are more organized, we did a ton of demos, and we have had a lot of great people join us with the promise of an even better 2012. I see a lot of dogs that might have the stuff to join the club team and push us even faster!