June 9, 2016
Blue Ridge Wentworth 2015 Is Grand Champion Foxhound at Bryn Mawr
Bryn Mawr 2016 Champion Foxhound of Show is Blue Ridge Wentworth 2015. Huntsman Graham Buston (right) shows Wentworth; Cheri Buston holds the lead. Judge Ian Farquahar, MFH, Duke of Beaufort's (UK) explains to the spectators the points of conformation upon which he bases his decision. / Chris Cancelli photo
Displaying activity, purpose, and movement while chasing the biscuit, Blue Ridge Wentworth 2015 staked his claim to the Midland Foxhound Trophy for Champion Foxhound of Show at the Bryn Mawr Hound Show on Saturday, June 4, 2016. It was no walk-away for the first-year English hound from Blue Ridge. He faced stiff competition from the other division champions, one of which was the Crossbred, Midland Striker, who came to Bryn Mawr having already been judged Grand Champion in two of this season’s sanctioned hound shows. Striker was Reserve Champion this day.
The class was judged by Ian Farquhar, MFH and huntsman of the Duke of Beaufort’s Foxhounds (UK). Farquhar was careful to explain to the spectators, using the hounds as examples, how he evaluated conformation and came to his decision.
Dark Horse: An Earnest and Sweet Documentary
Janet Vokes, a barmaid in Wales, had bred pigeons and whippets. She figured, why not breed a horse? She wheedled friends and neighbors—twenty-three in all—to join her in a collective by chipping in ten pounds a week for expenses. They bought a mare that had never won a race and had a habit of throwing her riders. And they bought a cheap stallion. In the course of time, a foal arrived. The story of these self-described commoners progresses through ups and downs for ten years and proves that “scrappiness and horse sense are underrated qualities.” Dark Horse, the documentary film by Louise Osmond won an audience award for world cinema at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival. Now appearing in theaters, the film is, according to Stephanie Merry writing for The Washington Post, an “utterly charming look at the unlikely success of Dream Alliance, a racehorse bred by a barmaid in a down-and-out Welsh mining village.” The people interviewed bring warmth and humor to the film, in particular, Vokes’s husband Brian. He’s a coal deliveryman whose tattoos and missing front teeth are distinctly at odds with most of the owners against whom their horse competes. The film is “earnest, sweet and told with sentimentality, featuring shots of horses frolicking in fields set against beautiful string music by Anne Nikitin. Surprisingly, the effect isn’t melodramatic or overbearing, but disarming and endearing.” “Dark Horse” (Sony Picture Classics): 3.5 starsRating: PG (contains horses in peril and strong language)Running time: 1:24 Click to read Merry’s entire article. Posted June 9, 2016
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