Westminster – Junior Showmanship Finals
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By Joan Harrigan
Just before the group judging on Tuesday night, the Westminster Junior Showmanship finalists enter the ring. They had to qualify for the privilege of competing at Westminster. Now, the top eight from the daytime preliminaries compete at the Garden for scholarship awards and the title of Best Junior Handler.
The scholarships can be used for post-secondary college or technical school, and are significant: $10,000 for the winner, $5,000 for second place, $4,000 for third, and $3,000 for fourth. The remaining four finalists all receive $500 scholarship awards.
The preliminaries were judged by Sioux Forsyth-Green of Center Cross, Virginia and Marianne “Tuni” Conti of Danbury, Connecticut. The finals were judged by Valerie Nunes-Atkinson of Temecula, California. Nunes-Atkinson won Best Junior Handler at Westminster in 1981; she was Best in Show with her German Shorthaired Pointer, “CJ” in 2016.
Valerie Nunes-Atkinson generously provided The Canine Chronicle with her comments about this assignment and her four placements:
“What a night, not only for the Juniors, but our sport as a whole. The eight finalists who came onto the Garden floor were everything I had imagined since receiving the exciting call almost two years ago from Mr. Dave Helming. Thank you preliminary judges, Sioux Forsyth-Green and Tuni Conti, for the extremely difficult task of choosing only eight to advance from the 100-plus highly qualified juniors.
“They sent on to the finals an excellent representation of our juniors. To have been given the very difficult task of judging these eight was truly an honor for me, and I’m so grateful to have been given the assignment.
“For me, it really came down to the details. All eight were excellent handlers, no doubt; but on the night of the finals, it was the fine points that enabled me to work through them in the very short amount of time allotted to me and come up with my placements.
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Posted by AnthonyA
on Apr 3 2020. Filed under Current Articles, Featured.
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