24 replies to this topic

[Rob Kane]

My personal thoughts would be this:
Move the trial a weekend earlier, this trial continously runs the week after Memorial Day and it runs a three day format. A lot of people who work can't take a day off during a week of a holiday. So run the trial on Memorial Day weekend. This way a three day format would ensure that they majority of people there wouldn't be losing a day's pay to be there.

In the grander scheme, it would be nice to see the championship run an All Age trial in the spring and the derbies run in the fall. The all age qualifiers come from the year before, so a lot of the finished dogs that would be running in the championship are an after thought to the guys who don't take part in the Purina points trials. If the derby championship was run in the fall it would give more time to qualify derbies for the trial, late derbies would have a chance to even be in the running for consistency awards. If it was thought that there would not be enough entries for the derbies, combine it with a field champion only trial to get people there.

[trial153]

I have to agree, if we hamstring ourself into thinking that the trial has to be run via three pens three days all classes ect ect...it. Paints us into a corner in regards to locations.

[gibble1]

Just a little history...championship trials were run at Cayuga Lake for several years until the club decided there was too much going on with their licensed trials schedules. We then tried rotating the trial. The one year we ran in New England we had a dismal turnout. Then we moved to Susquehanna and then to Lebanon. There has always been a debate about rotating versus stationary location. Frankly, if a club can handle the challenge and we can draw entries, I wouldn't care where it's held. Likewise, the FC-Only Trial used to be run independently of the All-Age and Derby Championships but then the entries dropped off to where it seemed very reasonable that the FC-Only trial should be combined with the other events and that resulted in a successful FC-Only trial over the past few years. I like some of these ideas, if there is enough support for them. I like Rob's idea of separating the Derby championship and running it in the fall, bringing in short derbies. I think that's kind of innovative. But will we attract enough derbies to make it worthwhile? Similarly, do we have enough help and sponsorship to run 2 or 3 events? Are there available dates for these events?

I do think that we could use a committee, comprised of several interested beaglers representing New England, Western and Eastern New York, Western and EAstern Pennsylvania, and the Association presidents to start mapping different strategies for the NEBGF and its events.

For many years we've been considered "second rate" and for some reason or another the idea of this Federation hasn't clicked the way it should. I would like to see us build this thing to where we are accorded the respect, sponsorship, and participation we deserve. Any steps toward efficiency and loyalty can only help. When I see 300 entries at the UBGF derby championship I wonder why we can't do half of that. I'm not saying that we have to be just like the UBGF or DSBGF, but what I do think we're lacking that both of those organizations have is loyalty. How do we develop that?

[Rob Kane]

John,
I may be wrong, but I don't believe that the NEBGF Championship has ever been ran in New England. I beleive that the Field Champion only was run at Tri County one year and was very short on entries. Correct me if I'm wrong, it might have also been ran at Eastern Connecticut one year.

We have some awesome clubs up here between Schnectady and Worcester that could play host to the trial if only two pens were required.

[gibble1]

You are right, Rob. FC Only was run at Tri County. I remember judging with Jason Wiseman, we had 15 inch bitches and there was only one 13 inch bitch that ran under us (and won). And again, it was a FC Only Tiral run at Eastern Connecticut. At Tri County I remembe we held a meeting, so that was why I thought it was the Championship.