History
of the Sport of Dock Dogs
Legend
has it that this sport started with two old duck hunters
who were sitting in a duck blind not having
very much luck with the birds. There
happened to be and old dock near by so they thought they'd
see if their dogs would jump off it.
In
1999 ESPN hired Melanie and Shadd Field through another
organization
(IRO) to stage dog events for The ESPN Great
Outdoor Games.
They were given the task to develop this new “dog
jumping” sport since at the time there really wasn’t
anyone doing it as a competitive sport. Their challenge was
to create a competitive event out of what had traditionally
been a fun pass-time, a fun activity at the fair, or as
a corporate demonstration. The essence was simple: “A
dog and handler team work together to jump the greatest distance.”
It began with
a 48 foot dock 24 inches off of the water simply because
that is what ESPN provided the
first
year. The jump is measured by the distance jumped between
the zero point and the closest point where the dog lands.
The starting point is measured from the rear of the
dog, versus the nose, to avoid bias due to the length of
the dog.
After
developing the rules and standards, it became obvious
that they needed to form a governing body. Jim Downs,
then the Director of the Great Outdoor Games, encouraged
Melanie and Shadd
to create a sanctioning body and develop qualifying competitions.
That is how DockDogs was born and in 2001 Melanie and Shadd
co-produced the televised qualifier The Sporting Dog Challenge.
That
show and the popularity of the event drew competitors from
all over the nation.
Today, Dock Dog and Big Air competitions are nationally
televised events and clubs are springing up all over the
US. So get your hyper labrador in the car and go sign
up!
*************
This
history is a condensed version of the detailed history
provided on the dockdogs website. To learn more about
this sport and read the complete history
visit:
www.dockdogs.com
Thanks
to Stan for sending me in the right direction to learn
about this great sport.
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