Region 5 Championships.......The Judges Scores

Part 1

You'd think with all that time away from home getting little sleep I'd be able to sleep in my own bed, wouldn't you? I hit that bed like a rock and went to sleep fairly easily........only to awake at about 1:30.........and after that, there was no more sleep for me.

With all the tossing and turning I'd done, I might just as well gotten out of bed and began looking over those judges scores. Once I awoke my brain would just not shut off, it kept churning the possibilities over and over. Maybe if I'd looked at the scores I'd have gotten back to sleep..........but then, knowing me I'd probably have moved onto planning strategies or making decisions. Who knows...........all I know is I sure didn't get much sleep.

When I did get up, the first thing I did after checking my emails and turning Rhet out to play, was check the judges scores. I was curious to see how Rhet had stacked up against the other colts in that class.

As I've mentioned before I really like this scoring system. It gives me the opportunity to see how each horse is viewed by each judge on its separate parts instead of just an overall view. Having seen some of these colts up close and personal helped me know more specifically how they compared in my view. Now I could see if the judges had seen the same things or not.

The first thing I noticed about these scores was the range was very different from those at Region 4. Then I had expected that since I'd thought this class was deeper. The low scores were as low as they'd been at four but the highs went higher.

The Enzo colt was not only the winner.....he was a unanimous champion. He didn't get just the highest scores in the class for his head. He got them as well for quality and type. Looking at that seems to suggest quality and type are greatly influenced by the head on an individual. I would have thought them to be more an overall impression......but then I haven't been to judge's school.

Other than the Enzo colt the judges seemed to be all over the place. However, two judges. Brian Murch and Beth Stover, did select the same five horses for the top five. Those five horses were the horses to place top five.

One judge, Beth Stover, placed all ten horses exactly as they ended up ranked in the class. There were 39 points between her first place horse and her last place horse. She scored Rhet 17 points under the Enzo colt but only 2 under the reserve champion colt. The fourth colt on her card was 3 points under Rhet. Rhet received 24 more points that the last horse on her card.

On Brian Murch's card, Rhet was only 4 points lower than the winner but he was still third on that card. The horse that ended up fourth overall (the Magnum Chall colt) received one more point that Rhet, making that horse second on Brian's card. The reserve champion was scored 6 points under Rhet by this judge as well so he really liked two colts better than the colt that ended up reserve. The point spread for high to low for this judge was 34 points. Rhet was 23 points higher than the lowest horse for this judge.

Gordon Potts, on the other hand, used two different horses in his top five picks than those selected by the other two judges In addition his low score was only 13 points off his high score. The horse that placed tenth in this class was third on Gordon's card. (It might be interesting to note this horse was not led by a big name handler in case some might wonder if this higher placing was politics. The handler was a relatively unknown. Gordon just liked this horse.)

Rhet was tied with another horse for fifth position on Gordon Pott's card. Rhet received only 4 points more than the lowest horse with this judge but then he was only 9 under the winner. In actuality, it was this low score that kept Rhet from being a reserve champion. (Rhet received 4 points less total score than the reserve horse.) Looking at the individual scores on each section I'd say quality, type, neck and body were the scores from Gordon Potts that affected Rhet's overall score. With that being said, I might add Gordon Potts scored Rhet the same total as two of the three judges at Region 4.

So if you've managed to follow all of this, what did all of this mean to me? It told me the worst scores I've seen for this horse had actually given him a reserve championship at Region 4, yet cost him the same at Region 5. Mostly it said that his scores were pretty solid. While they might go up under some judges, they probably would not go down under most.

To me that pretty much sounds like what I believe about my colt. He's a good solid individual. For me that meant taking Rhet to nationals might be a pretty safe bet.




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