Crufts 2023

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120 – May, 2023

By Amy Fernandez

Contrary to non-stop AR predictions, Crufts has not faded into oblivion. In fact, 2023 was mobbed from start to finish. Spanning Thursday through Sunday, March 9-12, spectator attendance at this supersized venue broke records throughout the four days. Both Saturday and Sunday, Birmingham’s NEC was forced to suspend ticket sales for several hours to achieve some modicum of crowd control.

A dusting of snow created much drama and panic in the West Midlands on Thursday morning, but what’s a dog show without some drama. There were the usual complaints about the parking and shuttle service, which comes with the vast territory of the NEC. Who cares about that stuff? What about the dogs? Entries exceeded 19,000, surpassing national specialty numbers in many breeds. There were very few absentees.

Thursday’s Gundog judging featured 290 Irish Setters, 180 Gordons, and 118 English Setters. That’s encouraging, although it paled in comparison to the usual blockbusters. Goldens raked in 491, and Labs had 537 entries. Even though retrievers are perennially popular, there were a couple of surprises. Flatcoats pulled 335 entries, which might have been partly due to the breed scoring Best last year. Better yet, Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever drew an impressive 175 entries.

Click here to read the complete article
120 – May, 2023

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Posted by AnthonyA on May 7 2023. Filed under Current Articles, Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.