Flyball: A fast-paced, fun, noisy sport for dogs and the owners who love them (video)

It’s all about dogs and their owners working as a team – a relay team.

The sport is flyball. It’s noisy, fast-actioned and fun.

Flyball entails teams of four dogs racing against each other on the clock over a flat, 51-foot course. Each dog runs from a starting line, over four hurdles to reach a box with a slanted surface that releases a tennis ball when the dog hits a plate on the lower part of the slated surface.

The dog grabs the ball in its mouth and then does a quick turnaround, similar to a turn made by a competitive human swimmer hitting the edge of a swimming pool..

With the ball in its mouth, the dog then re-traces the route back over the hurdles and past the starting line and to its handler. Just as the one dog crosses the line, the next one takes off.

Two flyball

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