nieuws - 09/10/2009 Bratislava World Dog Show 2009 Day 2 - Slowakije
door Karl DonvilThe second day report has 1.179 photos. Click on the photos to open the full file with maximum 10 photos.
It is only a few months ago when I spoke to the President of the Slowakian Kennel Club asking him how things were going. He was rather desperate at that moment as he had only about 7000 entries. He was worried and afraid that the financial crisis would have affected his long awaited World Show.
When I had a look at the final numbers just before the show I felt sorry for him again as no less than 21.830 dogs were entered and over 30.000 were in competition, the clubshows taken into account. That means that the majority of people are entering their dogs on the very last moment. This undoubtedly causes lots of problems to the organizers, certainly if it is double the amount of what was entered before. Everything needs to be re-planned in the last moment. Are there enough rings for all those dogs? Are there extra judges needed? Is there enough parking,? Will the catalogue be ready in time? Are there enough people to help with the very last administration?
I can very well imagine how stressful this all must be. There were lots of double entries, once via e-mail, a second time via fax and some once more via regular post. In the meantime people could check online if their dogs were properly entered. This is very nice but on the reverse side, many people didn’t find their dogs and started ringing, mailing etc. Instead of being patient they caused more worries. The payments were another problem. Some payments did not mention the dogs. The administration was forced to solve numerous of such puzzles. Russians have the habit to pay cash but not via Visa or Banktransfer etc. French still use cheques, etc. There has been a lot of critique on the organization, but what about the exhibitors who enter their dogs the very last moments? They should realize what problems this all causes. I can only feel sorry for the organization. And at the end most things were solved and running. “Chapeau !” I would say. The most important thing for events like this is the degree of flexibility. If a committee sticks too much on the initial plans, even if it turns out that they are not working, they should be inventive and flexible enough to make the necessary changes. This demands courage of course and good understanding between the members. On events like this there should be a person, a smart one who can plan things and make eventual changes possible. Hungary was a good show, even an excellent one if the traffic problem could have been solved the second day. As this was not the case, the frustration only grew from day to day, casting a real big shadow on the whole event. A pity for all things that were going well. Here in Bratislava there were some problems with the Press, sitting on the very far end with no proper sight while the stairs had room enough to reserve some seats for them. The second day this was done, compromises were made and from day two there were no longer major conflicts. There are always problems, always people who are not happy or complaining, but we must not forget all the things that were OK.
In order to prevent these problems in the future I think we must go to a system of Numerus Clausus which means that only a limited number of dogs will be allowed. Depending on the number of dogs per breed a certain number can be agreed. If we take for example two judges for the Golden Retrievers with 120 dogs per judge maximum, then 240 Golden Retrievers can participate. For every breed a realistic maximum of entries can be allowed. This way we know before how many dogs will be entered, how many judges we need to invite and it will never be overcrowded. But the most important advantage will be that exhibitors will try to enter as soon as possible instead of as late as possible. There will be much more time to do the registrations. And we can even go further. We could accept a certain number of reserves. In case a dog that is entered in time is not able to compete (bitch in season, dog died or whatever) the first reserve dog can take its place. The owner of the regularly entered dog receives a refund and the reserve dog has to pay an extra charge. This way committees can anticipate to possible problems and have more time to double check things.
I liked the idea of the shuttle buses between the clubshow area and the Incheba halls. This was done to no make the traffic worse than it already was. At the end it looked like it didn’t work very well and waiting times were long. OK, but as far as I can remember it is the first time that such an initiative was taken. That also means that there was no previous experience and probably the next time this will go better. The website was informative and the results were there every day, all results, not just the winners and this of every breed!
At the very last moment the organizers were forced to use another hall to install the main ring. This hall was not only smaller but less suited for this purpose. On the other hand the podium was very nice with a tall , non-reflective background showing a Slovakian castle. On the other side was a copy of the main podium. The winning dogs were supposed to show up there once more in case additional photos were needed. Unfortunately this didn’t work out very well as some came, others didn’t. The Press was lucky to be able to take photos at the main podium were all 3 winners were always there. It was not perfect and very messy at the start but this had mainly to do with security and language problems. Since the start of the WDPA there was a possibility to register only the real press, but it turned out again that too many people who were not Press at all were able to infiltrate without being picked out by the security. This is a structural problem that needs streamlining before the show starts. It should be announced that only registered Photographers will be allowed to take photos in the ring and that everybody else could use the copy podium if they also want to take a photo. Did you ever see running kids with mobile camera’s running to the athletes during the Olympic Games or the Grand Prix, Football game or the Tour de France? There should be no difference here and if it is allowed you cannot but expect troubles and chaos.
Perhaps it was a little too much emphasized that this was the biggest ever World Dog Show. We can only take into account the number of dogs, not the number of entries. In that case Crufts 2005 is still far out the biggest with 24.000 entries. Then comes Bratislava indeed, followed very closely by Stockholm with 20674 and then Poznan with 20836 (demonstrations and other competitions included). 147 judges from all over the world were invited to judge here, not only FCI judges but also judges from the British Kennel Club and the American Kennel Club. Besides that some 200 VIP’s were invited from 38 different countries, together with around 300 accredited journalists. On Friday the President of Slovak Republic, Ivan Gašparovi?, paid a visit to the show. Unfortunately no figures are available with regard to number of entries per country, but I presume it must be comparable with previous other shows in the area (like Poland, Austria or Hungary), only a little more of course. A list of the most successful breeds can be found at the bottom of this article.
373 dog breeds from 59 countries participated in various competitions, 36 breeds for the first time. The biggest number of dogs was registered from the Czech Republic [3474], Russia [2667], Italy [2 111], Poland [1586]. The most numerous breeds are American Staffordshire Terrier [291], Rhodesian Ridgeback, [286], Labrador Retriever [285], Cane Corso [263], Yorkshire Terrier [ [263], Beagle [216], French Bulldog [211] and Siberian Husky [209].
With regard to visitors this show was a big success but for the visitors themselves I think it must have been a big frustration. The two first days counted 10.000 visitors every day, but then came Saturday and Sunday, both good for 30.000 visitors per day, or around 80.000 during the whole show. Together with so many entries it was almost impossible to move around and I wonder how much the visitors were able to see. In my opinion it is not possible to predict how successful a show will be and how many visitors will turn up. There was a lot of publicity made in the city and on television and this usually works, especially television. There is no ideal formula to deal with overcrowded events. It creates frustrations on all sides but there is nothing much one can do. Another result of the success was that the rings needed to be small in order to have room for all breeds, a pity of course as on a prestigious show like the World or European show the dogs should be judged properly in spacious rings in order to find the best of breed in every way. Perhaps we should go to 5 days of show. Here it would certainly have been the best option to deal with most problems. The finals on Sunday were a little bit exaggerated with regard to the ceremonial part and extra’s. The main ring program started around 4 and ended at over 10 in the evening. There was just too much entertainment. The first 3 days were OK and the dancing acts in between the groups were much appreciated, but on Sunday it was just too much. Especially the ceremonial part with the presentation of all the countries and judges took much too long. People started to get so nervous and were shouting “Best In Show”. Of course the singing and dancing acts were much appreciated but too much is just too much.
Best In Show judge was Mr.Hans Müller, president of the FCI. He certainly had some top-dogs to chose from. 3rd Bis went to the lovely Toy Poodle CH SMASH JP CLOSE UP. This dog is from Japan , little over one year old, bred by YUKIKO OMURA and owned by YUKIKO OMURA. He was an excellent mover. DRUM?N?BASS SUNSHINE CELEBRATION was awarded ResBIS. This West Highland White Terriër is 5 years old and bred and owned by KRIŠOVÁ MARTINA. This lady is Slowakian and for that a nice surprise for public and committee. Best In Show went to the Pharao Hound NORTHGATE'S AS YOU LIKE IT. We remember this dog as res BIS at last year’s World Dog Show in Stockholm. He was BIS at the Nordic Winner in 2007, Group Winner at Crufts 2009 and Swedish Show Dog of the year in 2007. A really nice dog, fantastic mover and shower and in the hands of a top-handler . “Qing” , his nickname, was bred by UKURA HANNA & KARI and is owned by HALL JENNY from Sweden.
It was a long stressfull show for everyone, mainly due to the success with regard to entries and visitors. The circumstances taken into account, the organizors did very well. The team was rather small and perhaps some more responsabilities needed to be delegated by the President Mr.Stefic. I just hate to give critique on people who worked so hard, but delegating more responsabilities could probably have helped to prevent certain problems. It was the biggest FCI dog show so far, held in a relatively small country. What an achievement! Notwithstanding the problems, congratulations to the organization and the Slowakian Kennel Club.
The exhibitors should start to change their attitudes. They should double check their payments and not enter their dogs in different ways.And iInstead of waiting untill the very last moment to enter their dogs, they should do it much earlier. This way committees can anticipate better and make the arrangements much more in time. If certain breeds are overbooked they can make announchements on the website with regard to changements in the list of judges. Entrytickets could be send out in time, etc. Perhaps the FCI and committees should investigate if it would be possible to withdraw dogs that were entered before the first closing date. It could be a solution as now many owners hesitate untill the very last moment to enter their dogs. If this would only be allowed for this group, probably more people would be encouraged to enter their dogs much earlier. It could be something to consider.
