Sunday 21 May 2017

Royal Welsh - The Day

Beautiful action shot of Kaiah
The Royal Welsh Show ground is about 100 miles door to door, about the furthest I will travel to an open show... though this is classed as a "Premier Show!" It takes us about 2 and a half hours to get there, it's a fantastic drive through the heart of rural Wales, which to be honest adds to the day! Though the dogs are set slightly apart from the main show with a 5 minute walk you are in the heart of the show. It was a great place to take Kaiah, but all her early socialising meant she was bomb proof with everything and anything that was thrown at her. Other than wanting to join the Gundog trials, the little lady sure did me proud.
Lovely Loki 
There were 5 GSD classes on the day and being a Premier show the BOB is Crufts Qualifier. Kaiah went into the ring with Ian and did really well. She went and stood well and she was well chuffed when the judge told her she was "such a pretty girl!" I'm pleased with her second, the bitch that beat her was lovely and what makes it better is that she's owned by a lovely lady. Maybe on a different day it would have been Kaiah's class win, but no complaints from me.
Loki, now in with the big boys was in Open Dog. Again a faultless performance and even if I say so myself he looked stunning!
Sammi and I went into Open Bitch together. (No rude remarks please) and she gave me a great steady performance but was a little reluctant to use her ears .. still another class win. But now we had a dilema. For the challenge for BOB the winners go into the ring in class order, putting Sammi and I in front of Loki which I gathered may not work! Some quick thinking and I asked Angela to take Sammi in. I hope Loki would be calmer without me there. Well it half worked, he stood well, but it kind of fell apart on the movement as he tried too hard to keep up with his best friend gaiting in front of him. In contrary Sammi looked amazing with more drive than she had show with me. So it was to be Sammi's day and the BOB and Crufts qualifier was hers!
Me and My Sammi 
I felt it was only fair that Angela then take Sammi into the pastoral group, I was proud of her performance and even prouder of Group 3 out of 12 lovely BOB winners. It sure was Sammi's day and she behaved herself so well for Angela .. sometimes she can let herself down by screaming to come to me. That something I quite accept from her, owner obsession sure is part of the breed.


The Class Winners  -  Sammi and Loki at the front, to the puppy at the back.













I've edited the colour as it was quite a dark photo - so at least now we can see the competition!