DIR: Have you ever felt disadvantaged as an owner-handler?
EF: No, I don’t think it’s a disadvantage. There have been
times when I have looked around the ring at the competition
(like the Group at Westminster this year) and thought to myself, “How did I get here?” But then I realize my hard work
has paid off.
Jean
Hetherington
received the 2014
Winkie for Best
Owner-Handler
of the Year, and
presented Ed
Fojtik with his
2015 award at the
Show Dogs of the
Year Awards this
February in New
York City.
DIR: What advice would you give owner-handlers to up
their game?
EF: I hear a lot of owner-handlers say they lost to the handler and not the dog. That may be true on rare occasions. If
you want to win like a professional handler, then you have
to perform like a professional handler. So many owner-handlers show up a half hour before their ring time and are gone
the minute their breed ends. Hang out ringside. By watching
some of the great Doberman, Boxer and Sporting handlers,
you can learn so much. And being seen ringside regularly,
you will eventually get noticed and possibly asked to hold
and even show dogs. Again, the more time you spend in the
ring, the better.
DIR: Was it a foregone conclusion that you would show
your own dogs in the ring? Or did you ever consider a professional handler?
EF: Yes! Growing up, I always wanted the best horse on
the farm. Of course, I thought nobody
could show them better than I could.
It would not have been as much fun
for me to watch someone else show
If you continue to
my dog, that’s for sure. But as I get a
work hard every day
little older, I think about judging, and
and love what you do,
I would love to see a handler with one
of my dogs.
success will be yours.
DIR: How do you personally define
success in our sport? When did you
know that you had achieved it?
EF: I don’t think you can personally define it until your career
is over, and for everyone it is different. Gabriel Rangel has
won both Westminster and Eukanuba twice within the last
few years, and he still works as hard as ever. If you continue
to work hard every day and love what you do, success will
be yours.
DIR: How have dog shows changed since you began in the
sport? Do you feel the National Owner-Handled Series has
benefited the sport?
EF: As an owner-handler, I have mixed emotions about the
NOHS. I want to win the main Working Group and BIS. I almost feel that winning the NOHS Working Group is a consolation prize. I will say if they had it back when I first started,
I would have been glad it was there, as the more times you’re
in the ring the better, but I still would have worked to try to
win the main Group. I think most of us wish it did not hold
up the end of the show, especially on Sunday.
86
DIR: What has been the proudest moment in your dog-showing life? What
was your most memorable win?
EF: Winning the Winkie this year was
an incredible moment, winning the
breed during a few of our National
weekends has always been awesome
and winning the Breed at Westminster
after a number of attempts was unbelievable! Making the cut in the Group at
Westminster is one of my best memories ever. To hear David
Frei say that it was one of the tougher Working Groups that
he could remember and that I was in the final six or seven of
that Group meant everything to me.
DIR: If you had it to do all over again, would you do anything differently?
EF: My passion for winning and the breed would be the
same, but I might try learning to redirect my emotions in
other ways. DIR
Stay Tuned
Check back next month, when we’ll announce the nominees for the 2016 Winkies for Annual Achievement awards!
You can cast your vote using the ballot included in the
November issue.
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