Sunshine Coast Kennel Club hosts record entries for sporty format
By Kirra Livingstone
POOCHES big and small descended on the Beerwah Sportsground on March 22 and 23 for the inaugural Sunshine Coast Dog Olympics.
Hosted by the Sunshine Coast Kennel Club, the two-day event was a record-breaking weekend, with the new ‘Olympics’ format adding a number of new sporting categories including sprints, scent work, and tricks.
“We’ve had an amazing turnout this weekend, we’ve had so many entries, in all our shows and sports,” club secretary, Khylie Wood, said.
“We are really excited and really thankful that our exhibitors have come out and supported us, and we’ve had members of the public come and have a look and see the dogs doing all the different things.
“We had around 650 dogs in each show, so we’ve had three shows, and 140 scent work dogs, 40 trick dogs and then we had 100 sprint dogs last night (Saturday).” Ms Wood added she was pleased to see how smoothly their new format event went.
“The highlight for the weekend was the fact that we combined the shows and the sports together and everyone’s had such a great time,” she said. “It’s fabulous to see that dogs are so versatile, so being able to be shiny show dogs and then come over and do their tricks, network or even run on the sprint dog track.
“It’s fantastic to see the dogs just loving what they’re doing and owners loving to be here as well.”
She said it was always a surprise to see what judges favoured at show events, especially international judges.
“It’s great to see what their thoughts are about the breeds here in Australia,” Ms Wood said.
The Dog Olympics attracted a wide range of unique breeds such as hairless dogs, which most spectators may not have ever seen before.
