Proposed pointscore & dog/handler of the year

[Prue Winkfield]

[Moderator's note: this topic started as a reply to the 2004 Retrieving Trial Championship Summary topic on the Trial Schedules and Results Forum. The idea of a poinscore/ranking system seems to be gathering some steam so I have split the topic and brought this discussion over the General forum - cheers, Jason.]

Thanks Jason and congratulations to these people and their dogs. Interesting to see how few people dominate - it would also be interesting to rank them like tennis players and keep a a running list updated regularly. If it is possible would anyone like to see this? If so, could you rank the AA winners in each State as well - otherwise there would only be half a dozen people changing order ? This suggestion is just in case you have nothing to do Prue

[Jason Ferris]

Sounds like another great idea Prue.

It would be great to run a real-time tally/ranking system for all the dogs competing nationally then have a Dog and Handler of the Year.

Unfortunately I don't have time at present to set it up, particularly as I have just taken on the jobs of President and Trial Secretary for the Working Gundog Club of NSW.

I case I do get time in 2005 (or we have a willing volunteer?? ), can anyone explain to me how the Victorian Dog of the Year tallies work? Do Novice and Restricted dogs get included? Who coordinates it? How do the results find their way to him or her?

Cheers, Jason.

[Prue Winkfield]

Jason - sorry I can't volunteer as don't have the computer skills that would be needed! Think the Victorian one is done by Rick & Judy Johnson manually and they include all dogs in all stakes. However, think just doing the AA dogs (would also have to add weighting for National and Championships) would be hard enough at least to start with. As I am not an AA type and have always wanted to promote Novice and Restricted, if a formula could be found for AA perhaps someone could then do it for the other stakes? Wonder how many non-AA handlers participate in this forum? Prue

[Gareth Tawton]

Prue,

The ACT dog of the year is a points system of all trials held in NSW and ACT for the year plus Champs.

Points awarded as follows:

Champ win 12
champ 2nd 6

AA 1st 6
AA 2nd 5
Rest 1st 4
Rest 2nd 3
Nov 1st 2
Nov 2nd 1

The onus is on the handler to nominate their dog. As a result some years we have not had a winner!!!!

Gareth


Gareth

[Prue Winkfield]

Hi Gareth - are you on a laptop in the hospital? we have similar in the GSP Club but of course no one gets as far as AA or Championships these days! Belive the Vic Gundog Club do the same but with nominated trials and not many people put in for that either. Don't know how it could be done countrywide unless we had standard points and rely on the state reps on this forum for the info and then someone would have to do a spread sheet, etc. All time consuming! Hope you are looking forward to some sleepless nights Prue

[Noel Eltringham]

VCA Retrieving Trial Dog of the Year

The conditions of the VCA Retrieving Trial Dog of the Year were published in Vicdog July 2000.

To be eligible for the VCA RTDOY you have to be a VCA member and your dog registered with the VCA. In summary the VCA Retrieving Trial Dog of the Year is based on the cumulative results of retrieving trials conducted in Victoria each calendar year.

Points are awarded on the following basis:

Championship Stake:

1st 12 pts
2nd 11 pts
3rd 10 pts

All Age Stake

1st 9 pts
2nd 8 pts
3rd 7 pts

Restricted Stake

1st 6 pts
2nd 5 pts
3rd 4 pts

Novice Stake

1st 3 pts
2nd 2 pts
3rd 1 pt

It is the responsibility of the RAFT Retrieving delegates to determine the results of the VCA RTDY each year. At the moment one person compiles the scores and this is checked by someone else on RAFT.

[Jason Ferris]

Thanks for the info Gareth and Noel. It seems that a national system wouldn't be too hard to manage with a simple database, using the results published here as the source of the information (and thereby avoiding all of the hassle of chasing results or having owners/handlers reporting them).

If people think it worthwhile, I will put some more thought into this.

Cheers, Jason.

[Karen Parnell]

Hi Jason.

We have a title "NZ Gundog of the Year" over here. It is awarded each year at the NZ Champs (held each Labour Weekend in October) and for the past 8 years has been awarded to the same dog - Peter O'Neill's ESS Grand Field Trial Champion Duke of Granger (Bill).... he has amassed almost 200 CC's in his career which is a record.

Points are collated from NZ to NZ but EXCLUDES the Island championships (probably equivalent to your State Champs) so only club championships are counted and as a challenge is only awarded to 1st place... these are the ones that are tallied, 1 point for each. The results are recorded and collated by the NZ Gundog Trialling Assn secretary - as she is the one who also sends out the coveted Challenge Certificates!!

At the majority of our champs we run a Retriever event, a Spaniel event, a Pointer/Setter event and an All Breeds event. Most dogs enter their breed and the All breeds event giving them the chance to pick up two cc's in a weekend - thus two points towards the NZ Gundog of the Year title.

It is a highly contested title and as Bill turns 10 years old today, his grasp is starting to slip... It will be interesting to see who gets it next year!

It would be great if you could get something similar up and running on this site!

Cheers
Karen.

[Laraine Frawley]

If the majority think having a dog and handler of the year and running a point system of dogs a good idea, I am willing to compile it. If all the results come into this site, there shouldn't be much chasing up. Are we getting the results for all trials from all clubs run throught the year? A simple excel spreadsheet set up to give progressive totals to each dog should be all that is needed. I personally think we should include all 3 levels. It gives new people in Novice a chance to get their dogs name up there which helps add to their sense of achievement especially if they are new into the sport. By setting it up now we would be ready to run it for the 2005 year with the first trial in January.

Laraine

[Jason Ferris]

Thanks for the offer Laraine!

In 2004 we have done pretty well at having most of the trial results posted, although some took a while. Hopefully with the pointscore/rankings system operating there would be an added incentive for people to post results sooner.

Do people think we need to put a proposal on this to the National Retrieving and Field Trial Committee? If so I am happy to draft something and post it here for comment (but I will be out of action for the next two weeks for work).

I agree about including all levels. The Vic RT Dog of the Year system does this and seems like a good model to me.

Cheers, Jason.

[Laraine Frawley]

I don't think we need to go to the National RAFT. This is a pointscore for us, the handlers interest, and has no official standing. The "winner/s" of the pointscore whether it be just AA or all 3 levels are winners in the eyes of their peers and don't get any official recogition. Of course if we the competitors wanted to make it more than that, nothing would stop us all contributing to a lasting momento.

Laraine

[Kerry Webster]

Hi All,

We have a point score system here with the CAWA for Retriever of the Year, which is taken only on All Age Trials.

To be eligible for the title, a dog must have placed first in an All Age stake. It is then eligible to gain points for that season, and each successive season of trialing.

Points awarded are: 1st place......9 points

2nd place ....6 points

3rd place .... 3 points

For State Championships: 1st place........12 points

2nd place .......6 points

Kerry

[Gareth Tawton]

Hi everyone,

A pointscore sounds great. AA is easy but maybe a little more thought needs to go into Nov and Rest. IF a pointscore is to recognise the best Nov or Rest dog that would be difficult as a good nov or Rest dog could win 3 quite quickly and be out of the running for more points during the year. While a better but not great Nov dog keeps placing and only wins one or two trials and gains more points. We would be recognising mediocrity not the best.

Perhaps it would be better to have Nov and Restricted combined. Call it "derby", "Rookie" or whatever with equal points for wins, 2nd and 3d in both Nov and Rest.

What do you think?

Gareth

PS My new found tip for the day. Baby's cut down both training and sleeping time

[Laraine Frawley]

I agree for Novice and Restricted the same number of points for each place and a dog in Novice carries their points throught into Restricted for that year. The same would happen with a dog in Restricted advancing up to AA. Also once a dog has run at a higher level it is not eligible for points if it runs again at the lower level eg a dog in Novice is also entered in Restricted only then gets points for its Restricted achievements.

Laraine

[Gareth Tawton]

Laraine,

Given wins at one level will count at the next eg Nov to Rest why would you bother not counting points after a dog has run at a higher level? This makes so much xtra work. How do you know if a dog has been run in a restricted for experiance without having won 3 novices. I think it would be easier to just included Novice and Restricted together. This is easy to compute, encourages people to enter more trials and has a good level of equity.

The easy way (to me) would be all Nov and Rest point combine fo Rookie of the year. While any Rest, AA and Champ point combine for AA dog of the year. Nov doesn't count for AA.

Gareth

PS when you have finalised a method it could be posted on the web with a start date of 1 Jan 2005. Finish date the last trial of the Calendar year which I think might be the Brittany club in Vict November 2005.