Friday, July 22, 2011

Havanese Club of America - Regional Specialty Thursday, July 21, 2011


Judge - Ann Hearn
MBIS AM GCH CAN CH Adorabull That's Better Than Sex
Roché was awarded an Award of Merit.

That's The Notorious Defender, aka Mason (Perry Mason).  Owned by Connie Rousch and Kathy Kosich.  A beautiful Desi - Godiva (Roche's sister) boy.  An entry of 39 dogs, Mason, Won the BBE Class (tied with the puppy class for the largest number of entries).  We were hoping to break his Reserve streak, but that didn't happen today.  Maybe tomorrow?
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Not just my opinion:
Not consistent Judging today, but Congratulations to the Winners.  There seemed to be some confusion when it came to awarding Awards of Merit and Select.  The two last dogs in her line-up were awarded Select points.  The dogs that she chose first, were given Awards of Merit and therefore no points towards their Grand Championship rankings.  Before all the Grand Champion points, if we couldn't win BOB or BOS, then we wanted that first AOM.  We should still want that spot but it should be worth something other than bragging rights.  According to the following information from the AKC, Selects are to be placed first behind BOS, then AOMs, or they can be placed and awarded in conjunction with each other. 

Our judges have been advised on numerous occasions the relationship between Selects and Award of Merits at specialty shows.  Following is one example of the information that has been given to the judging community regarding this relationship:

                Awards of Merit are a club award, the restrictions and /or guideline in regard to the eligibility and number awarded are at the discretion of the event hosting club. 

Unless specified otherwise, it is at the discretion of the judge whether to award Selects and AOMs independently or to have the Selects also recipients of an Award of Merit.  Regardless, since the Select is an AKC award, it is of greater significance than the Award of Merit.  In other words, if the judge should choose to award them independently, the judge would select BOB, BOW, BOS, Select Dog, Select Bitch AND THEN their Awards of Merit from the remaining entries in the ring.  If they were to choose to overlap them, the Selects would be the highest Award of Merit that was eligible to receive a Select.

We have seen this happen time and time again.  At the Bichon regional in conjuction with the National last year, the judge actually announced that she wasn't sure how to place them so what did we (the exhibitors) want her to do?  We, the exhibitors, just want them to do it right, no matter who they place, just know the breed, be consistent, and do it the way it is supposed to be done. 
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