Labrador retrievers are the No. 1 breed in the country. Their Best-in-Show wins at Westminster? None.
SLIDE SHOW: http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2011/02/15/sports/SPTSDOG0215.html?ref=sports
MORE PHOTOS: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/c/a/2011/02/15/MN3F1HNNHQ.DTL&object=%2Fc%2Fpictures%2F2011%2F02%2F16%2Fba-108760708SP00_0502979724.jpg
By KATIE THOMAS
c. 2011 New York Times News Service
In the hours before a dog competes at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, tensions can mount as owners and handlers furiously prepare their canine divas for the ring.
Hair is blown straight or teased into fanciful poufs. Snouts and paws are daubed with talcum powder. Wayward hairs and whiskers are trimmed with precision.
Over by the Labrador retrievers, owners and handlers lunched on hamburgers and mingled with their neighbors before their competition Tuesday afternoon.
Orange power cords dangled idly from the ceiling. The dogs napped in their crates.
Meili, a yellow Lab from Brooklyn, had spent the morning playing in Marine Park. Her owners, Micki Beerman and Linda Pensabene, did not bother to give her a bath, let alone trim her whiskers or toenails.
“We just made sure she didn’t have any more sand on her face,” Pensabene said as she wiped Meili’s muzzle with her hand.
The Labrador retriever is the most popular breed in the United States, according to American Kennel Club registration statistics.
And yet, when set against a Westminster backdrop of elegant Afghans, jaded poodles, lumbering St. Bernards and impertinent Pomeranians, the humble Labrador retriever can get lost in the crowd.
So perhaps it is not surprising that the Labrador retriever has never won Best in Show in Westminster’s 135 years.
Other breeds better known as pets have also been overlooked.
The golden retriever has never won, either, and the German shepherd and the pug have only won once apiece.
In 2008, Uno the beagle became a household name after he was the first of his breed to win the top prize.
Jenifer Haekl, who was showing her pug, Newman, on Monday, said pugs, too, are not properly respected.
She does little to prepare Newman, other than feeding him a diet of luxury dog food and chicken livers and shampooing him with Suave the night before shows.
“There really is not a lot you can do,” she said.
The story is the same for Maxxim, a beagle owned by Victoria Braddock.
She washed him for Westminster because he had recently been digging in dirty snow, but otherwise, he only gets a bath “when he starts smelling like a dog.”
Maxxim does get his nails trimmed, along with the stray hairs along his throat and the tip of his tail.
Still, she said, “You are supposed to be able to take them from the field to the show ring.”
Wendi Huttner owns Wes, a 7-year-old black Lab who visits five elementary school classes a week in Richboro, Pa.
Sometimes, Huttner wonders about the high-maintenance dogs who spend their lives on the road.
“I see them walking with towels on their backs and with their ears pinned down and I wonder what kind of life they have,” she said.
Huttner says Labs and other ordinary dogs suffer precisely because they are so wash and wear.
“I think they’re too plain for the judges,” she said. “They look for something with flowing hair — more curb appeal for the audience.”
Labrador and other family-pet owners take pride in their dogs, of course.
They note that outside the show ring, Labradors are all-purpose dogs, skilled at guiding the blind, performing search-and-rescue missions, sniffing out bombs and excelling at nearly everything they are asked to do.
“It doesn’t go: ‘Me! Me! Me! Me!’ ” said Sue Willumsen, a show judge who has been breeding Labradors for three decades. “It’s not a ‘ta-da’ dog. It says, ‘Let’s go out hunting.’ ”
Because golden and Labrador retrievers are in the sporting group at Westminster, judges look for fitness and muscle tone.
Sandy Nordstrom and Bob Ashenbrenner feed their golden retriever, Benny, a diet of raw bison, chicken and ground vegetables, and put him through regular workouts.
He likes to romp through the brush near their home in Austin, Tex. Even so, “if we brought him in with thistles in his coat, he probably wouldn’t win,” Ashenbrenner said.
Still, some Labrador owners say their breed is overdue for a big win.
“I think it’s a cold shoulder, because Labs are the No. 1 breed,” said Eileen Ketcham, whose sister, Susan, was showing Sam, a 3-year-old black Labrador.
Pensabene made much the same point.
“It makes me crazy, because how many Irish water spaniels do we have?” she said. “They always go for the flashy, and Labradors are just a good, reliable, sturdy dog.”
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: February 16, 2011
A caption for a picture in a slide show in an earlier version of this article incorrectly identified a breed of dog. It is a Bernese Mountain Dog, not a Burmese Mountain Dog.
Original Story: http://feeds1.nytimes.com/~r/nyt/rss/…
