Northamptonshire junior flyball team 'very proud' after qualifying for Crufts 2022

A junior flyball team from Northamptonshire has qualified for Crufts 2022 with a team of six dog handlers aged from eight to 21 years old.

Flyball is a sport in which teams of dogs race against each other from the start to the finish line - over hurdles - to collect a tennis ball from an upright box, then run back to their handlers with the ball in their mouth.

The Northants Twisters flyball team is based in Northampton and is a junior team under the Northants Falcons banner. The juniors entered the Crufts Young Kennel Club qualifier at Hedsor Golf Course last year and is now set to compete against eight others in the Crufts flyball championships at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham next month.

Katie Mabutt, 36, from Parklands, is captain of the Northants Twisters junior flyball team. She said: "We are all very proud and, even if they don't get through, we are still very proud because getting there is very impressive. I did Young Kennel Club as a junior so, to be captain of the team now, it is quite nice."

Katie owns six dogs - five of which, have competed at Crufts.

The team is described as very 'family-oriented' with three generations of Katie's family being heavily involved in competitive flyball including her mother, Angela, and her nine-year-old daughter, Sienna, who will be competing as a runner in the junior team.

The Northants Twisters compromise of six handlers - aged from eight to 21 - and their dogs including Eden Coleman, Sienna Mabutt, Isobelle Coleman, Sophie Harte, Ruby Prestidge, and Liam Grant.

Amelia Hall is the team's all important box loader.

Katie continued: "It is pretty brutal out there at Crufts so you just have to have fun really.

"I am excited and nervous. The kids will be fine. Our kids will do what they do and have fun and they'll be proud regardless of the outcome. They do tournaments throughout the year so this won't be their first time."

The Northants Twisters junior flyball team will compete at Crufts 2022 on the morning of Saturday, March 12.

The competition operates as a 'knock-out' system and each race is the best of three legs. The fastest two teams go through to the final.

Tony Pay runs in the Northants Falcons Flyball team and takes photographs for the junior team. He said: "We are really looking forward to seeing them perform. They have been competing against adults and pulled their own over the winter and I think they are going to do really well.

"To get out and perform in front of six and a half thousand people, it is quite daunting - can you imagine doing that as a 10-year-old?"

Northants Dog Training Club is an obedience dog training club that has been Kennel Club registered since 1956, making it the oldest dog training club in Northamptonshire. The club runs a variety of evening classes for both beginner and advanced dog handlers, who wish to enter their dogs into obedience competitions.

The club formed their own flyball team in 2006, called the Northants Falcons. Flyball training is carried out separately to obedience classes with sessions being held on Tuesday evenings during the summer at Cogenhoe and Whiston Village Hall and on specified weekends during the winter at Low Farm, Easton Maudit, Bozeat.

The flyball team currently has around 32 dogs and 24 members - eight of whom are juniors.

This follows after the Chronicle & Echo covered a story about flyball team, 'The Molten Magnets' - based in Moulton - qualifying for the Crufts Flyball Championships next month.