European Open this weekend!

The European Open 2008 gets underway this weekend in Gelsenkirchen, Germany.

The competition is accredited by the FCI and based on the FCI agility regulations 2007. It's open for all dogs, with or without pedigree.

All FCI member national organizations or associated national organizations are invited to participate in this competition. Teams from the following countries are expected to compete: Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, England, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland and the USA.

The individual competition in the large, medium and small categories will take place on July 19, 2008. The team competition in the large category, as well as in a mixed category small/medium will take place July 20, 2008 and the award ceremony for all competitions will take place on July 20, 2008 after the team competition has been completed.

We could only find one bit of information on the US Team, to date. Here's an article from the Journal-Register about Della Sliker and her sheltie, Jazzmine. Jazzmine will be the youngest dog on the 30-member U.S. Team. Other team members we found who are attending include: Sliker, Erin Schafer, a five-time World U.S. Team Agility Competitor and individual gold medalist from Massachusetts, her husband Ben Philbert and Mary Jo Johnson of Farmington who will form a four-member team during group competitions.

If we find more information as the competition progresses, we'll keep you posted. Good luck to Team USA and all the competitors!

And to get you in the mood, here's one of Sylvia Trkman's runs at the finals last year...enjoy!