A dog or bitch has to be the best of it's sex on 3 occasions under 3 different judges, and must be over 12 months old when winning the final one, at Championship shows where Challenge Certificates are on offer for that breed.
The number of sets of these depens on the popularity of the4 breed in numbers at shows and the number beeing bred.
In my breed we have 18 sets a year, with between 40 and a 100 Exhibits competing for them at any one show (the number of exhibits depends on where the show is, fewer in the outlying shows such as Scotland, and the judge).
There will be usually five or more classes for each sex, ranging from age classes like Puppy and Junior, to classes that depend on number of previous wins (Post Graduate, Limit etc) and an Open class, which is the only one that Champions can enter in the breed, and also for those dogs who have won out of the earlier classes.
The judge will judge each class, and place from 1st to 5th. When all the classes for each sex have been judge the class winners will return for the Best of Sex to be chosen, and the Challenge Certificate (CC) will be awarded if the dog/bitch is of Sufficient Quality. The the Reserve Challenge Certificate will be awrded to one of the other class winners, or the dog/bitch that stood second to the CC winner in it's class.
When both sexes have been judged the Best Dog and Bitch will challenge for Best of Breed, who will then represent the breed in Group judging. The Best In show is then chosen from the 7 Group winners.
Arguably because of the level of competion, the restriction on number of chances of winning the CC, and of course the fact that Champions continue to compete for these also, so a dog has to get past the existing Champions as well as all the other exhibits, it is the most difficult to make up a Champion in the UK.
By Guest ![[gb]](/images/flags/gb.png "United Kingdom")
Date 17.12.04 07:08 UTC
In the UK it has to win three Challenge Certificates under different judges, with one being won when it is at least 12 months old.