Congratulations Ezri, first flyball dog to achieve 4,000 points

Ezri was born in August 1999 and was part of Astro’s first litter. She started training with Bellarine Dog ActivitiesGroup but never ran withthem as at the time they only had one established team. Wendy Gauntlett decided to give Ezri to her father Ian so she could have someone to take her to flyball. Ian subsequently joined the Croydon Rockets with Wendy and Ezri first ran in a competition at Wonthaggi in January 2001.

Ezri performed very well and managed to sneak into the top team with Astro for her second competition at the Canberra Royal as Croydon had unfortunately lost their Labrador Taffie at Wonthaggi after another dog had a go at Taffie. Croydon at the time didn't really realise that Ezri up to that point had pretty much only ever run by herself or with Astro before her first competition, only havinga run after Bellarine’s main dogs had practised. She had only run with and against other dogs at one demonstration where she actually ran with the Hastings dogs Sam and Matilda. At her first two day comp in Canberra she ran as part of a four dog team and did not make a single mistake except one heat where every member of the Scientists got mixed up which was a real comedy of errors.The team managed to win every other heat over the two days jumping over 11" jump heights.

Ezri and Astro along with the amazing height dog Jeddah ran together on the Scientists for many years teaming up with at first Jagger and Taffie and then a little later with the leggy Labrador Penny. At that time the team was unbeatable and held the National record and Division 1 National Title for many years.Croydon travelled regularly to competitions at Canberra, Sydney and Adelaide as well as in Victoria and Ezri was always there with them.

Later Ezri ran with Jamaica and Oscar when she became the height dog with the team jumping over 13". Then Ezri ran with Lexi, Ricky and Klay, throughout still running with her father Astro. Until Astro really started slowing down they were only ever apart when Croydon mixed the teams to give other dogs a chance at winning the division. Astro finally returned to Bellarine where he had started but Ezri has run with Croydon over her whole career.

Even at nearly 11 years of age Ezri still runs around 5.2 seconds and is as excitable coming into the ring today as she was when she first started. At the Portland competition held in June this year she finally gained 4000 title points being the first dog in the AFA to do so. Ian and Wendy had hoped that Astro and Ezri would get to 4000 points at the same time and it was looking likely to happen until Astro had to unfortunately withdraw after the first race at the Hastings two day competition and Bellarine Veterans team due to nerve damage affecting his rear leg strength 47 points shy of 4000 title points.