Pacing

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212 – September, 2026

By Lisa Dubé Forman

Another day, another Facebook outburst from an exhibitor, this time raging about judges who twice awarded a class dog Best of Breed over the Champions. The scandal? The dog allegedly paced during Best of Breed, though even the critic conceded it trotted in class judging for Winners. The exhibitor poured their frustrations online, blaming this incident for the shrinking number of dog show entries and dramatically predicting the sport’s imminent demise.

But like so many others, this exhibitor seems oblivious to the true reasons entries are dwindling. They pay no heed to soaring vet bills, climbing dog food costs, the glut of all breed shows, and the relentless number of show clusters–the real forces driving the decline. Instead, they cast blame on judges, accusing them of failing to grasp the sacred art of “movement.”

The exhibitor fumed that, although the dog trotted to the judges’ satisfaction during Winners, it paced during Best of Breed, and she was incensed by the result, especially, she insisted, because the breed is in the Working Group! I couldn’t help but be amused by this, considering that for millennia, tens of millions of people have depended on Hound breeds to help put food on the table as indispensable partners in survival. Evidently, movement is only a crisis when it happens in the Working Group.

Click here to read the complete article
212 – September, 2026

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Posted by AnthonyA on Sep 18 2026. 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.