Thread: Gone..........................but not forgotten.

Maybe something like this already exists but I'll start this off anyway.



This was the first trial I ever won and it was a biggie. The Kennel Club wouldn't allow another "Champion Stake" to be run so in Northern Ireland we had what was called "The All Winners Stake". The qualification was technically higher than for the Kennel Club Champion Stake as no second placed dogs got a run. Your dog had to have won an open stake. The next year the Kennel Club changed the rules and the All Winners was consigned to history so this victory for me in 1988 was the last time it was run. In addition to being my first Open Stake win, and effectively the Northern Ireland Championship it also made Ghillie up to F.T.Ch.
Ghillie's high faluttin name was F.T.Ch. Innistona Slay from the well known and dare I say World Famous kennel of Davy Reid. Originally he was owned by Will Sloan who had won one open stake with him and had two placings and a couple of Diplomas in The Champion Stake. The day Will moved to The Isle of Man he called and gave me Ghillie. My wife was very hard on Ghillie. She christened him the world's ugliest dog and to be fair he wasn't pretty. He was a strange big dog. He would roll about in the heather at your feet at a trial and play with other dogs (he was eight when I got him) but the moment you let him off the lead it was all work.
I was very fond of this dog. As I said he was eight when I got him and the work he absorbed while I got him fit was truly awesome.