Buffalo Wings and fellow flyballers,

Congratulations to all the Buffalo Wings, young and old, for a great Summer of flyball so far. As we quickly approach our October tournament, I want to point out some highlights from this Summer and especially our most recent tournament in Binbrook.

First of all, we have managed to travel to 5 tournaments since our Spring tournament in Batavia. We attended Caledonia, Ontario in June, Massachusetts and Charlottetown, PEI in July, Sandusky, Ohio in July and Binbrook, Ontario in August.

At our Spring tournament, we had 2 dogs achieve titles with Annie receiving her Flyball Masters in only her second tournament back after a big layoff to retrain her box turn which is still a work in progress but is much safer than it was a year ago. Also receiving his ONYX was Zip who is our ever present start dog and was able to have his main handler, Jonathan, who has since moved on to college, present to run him in his ONYX race. John has now taken over the reigns of Zip but he will be the first to tell you that Zip still loves running for his boy the best.

At Instant Replay's tournament in Caledonia, Ontario, things got off to a shaky start with a tornado warning Friday afternoon which we all managed to escape without any harm. A special thank you goes out to Adrienne and Stacy from the York Animal Hospital that came up with us for the weekend and helped out ball shagging and holding dogs. Our accomplishments included a first place finish with our Regular Kamikaze team in division 3 with our flyball machine Reese taking over the height dog duties while waiting for Bounce to return to form.

We next made a big trek to Massachusetts for Flyball & Fireworks to race within our own region for a change. Our big accomplishment here was that our Multi team, which normally we are thrilled to just finish a race, came away with a first place finish. Molson anchored this team in the height dog position and came away with his FDCh-G title. Molson is quickly becoming a flyball machine and is loving his full time height dog role.

The crazy Emo clan drove through the night following the Massachusetts tournament to race in Charlottetown the very next day. Yes, we watched the sun rise as we passed over the Confederation Bridge. The Road Rage team consisting of all of our own dogs, almost broke out their first heat of the day with a 20.99 second run when I wasn't sure we would even break 24 seconds running RobRoy, Skye, Reese and Keirra. After that, Skye calmed down and we came back to Earth to run mostly 23 seconds the rest of the day. Foster even got a couple clean heats in and Butter make a warm-up appearance. Skye achieved her FMCh at her old stomping grounds in the last heat of the day.

A small Buffalo Wings crew made it out to Region 1 for the Sandusky, Ohio tournament and had a great time racing with a bunch of new faces and teams. Cindy, Keri and Ailsa spent the Friday evening before racing at Cedar Point Theme Park riding roller coasters until they puked. A great time was had by all racing flyball and then the adults took over and won human flyball on Saturday night. We were rewarded greatly with mojitos and liqueurs. The new 4 Alarm team with Zip, RobRoy, Shanzii, and Molson with Reese as backup pulled out a 3rd place finish in Division 2.

Our most recent quest was to one of our favorite tournaments in Binbrook, Ontario. We had multiple individual and team accomplishments with Bounce making his return to the regular team and after a long day on Saturday, finally pulling together on Sunday to not only receive his FM but help the Regular team pull out a first in Division 4. Shanzii received her FMCh and RobRoy his ONYX (just 4 months after his FMCh). Keirra got her new personal best at dock diving on Friday night and was awarded a Novice ribbon. We enjoyed good food, mojitos and great company. The club enjoyed both the Emo/Currie and Palmer new old campers that make the whole "camping" experience more enjoyable for all.

We look forward to attending Cookstown in September and seeing everyone at our tournament in October.

Toby Emo, DVM