And now the continuation of the dog show and what the heck is a Reserve Winner's Dog?

So I have told you why we show our dogs and how the classes are broken down and what is required to finish your dog. But now what? What do all those numbers mean when it comes to the show ring? Sometimes even I get confused at the whole process, but it can be very simple. The easiest way to go about this is to break down the winners.

Best of Breed (BOB or BISS which stands for Best in Specialty Show): This is the top winner of the Breed, the best Saint Bernard (or whatever breed) there at the show and will move forward to compete in the Group Competition.

Best of Opposite (BOS): This is the second best of the Breed. It is always the opposite sex of what won the Breed. So if a male dog wins the Breed, the BOS is always a bitch unless one isn’t present and then the award just isn’t given.

Winner’s Dog (WD): The best male dog out of the classes (unfinished, not championed dogs).

Winner’s Bitch (WB): The best female dog out of the classes (unfinished, not championed bitches).

Best of Winner’s (BOW): The best of the two class dogs mentioned above. I know, sounds silly to have to choose between the male and bitch, but there is a reason (to finish your dog) for it that I will explain.

Reserve Winner’s Dog/Bitch (RWD, RWB): The second best dog and bitch out of the classes. Gets a red ribbon. We have lots of those from Sinatra. Can’t you tell I’m bitter? Don’t get ya anything!

You look at the entry and it says for Saturday’s show it’s 5-5(2-1). The 1st five is class dogs, the 2nd five is class bitches, the two is for Special Dogs and the one for Special Bitches. Special Bitches and Dogs are those that have their Championship already. In Saints, they usually do not break the numbers down anymore than that. So when you get to a show, you have to look at the catalog to see who is in your class, whether it’s the Open Shorthair or American Bred. To make this easy, let’s just say that there are two dogs in the Novice Class, two in the Open Short and one in the American Bred. The two in the Novice class would go in the ring first. The judge would award a first and a second. The American Bred would go in and hopefully get its first place ribbon, and it does. The two remaining in Open Short would go in and get their places. You now have three dog with first place ribbons and two dogs with second place ribbons. The three first place winners go in the ring next. From there, the judge picks the Winner’s Dog, meaning the best of the dogs. Say that dog is from the Open Short class. He gets his ribbon and leaves the ring while the second place winner from the Open Short goes in the ring with the other two first place class winners and the judge then picks the Reserve Winner’s Dog. And this process is repeated for the class bitches.

So the last ring is the Breed Ring. The Specials go in and so do Winner’s Dog and Winner’s Bitch. They are always at the end of the line. The judge will go over the Specials and may go back over the WD and WB. From here the judge will pick the BOB, BOS and BOW. This can become confusing because it is very possible for the BOW to go BOB or BOS.

The thing about BOW is that it can be a major in bitches (3 or more points) and only one point in males. But if that judge gives the BOW to the WD, he will get the major points too. It’s called crossing the points over. He would get the major points because he beat all the bitches. This is how we got Sinatra’s first major on him by going BOW in a bitch major. Polly won the bitch major too, but Sinatra beat her to get BOW.

On a side note, if you’re watching Breed Ring and can’t make out if it’s a male or female, the armbands have numbers and the bitches are always even and the males are always odd numbers.
Hope this article was helpful. If you have any questions, please ask. I’ll try to answer!

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