Donald Sturz, this year’s Best in Show judge, has spent the last few days kidnapped in his hotel room, isolating himself from any news about which dog has won any prize in the competition so far.
“No Facebook, nothing,” Sturz, 60, said on the phone. “I stay out of social media. I posted a picture of myself and my husband at the judges’ dinner on Sunday night, and then I was silent on the radio.”
The idea, he said, is that when he enters the ring tonight, he is free from prejudice.
“Part of the dream of this task of judging is to go out on the floor and have no idea who the seven dogs are coming in,” Sturz said.
The best to judge the show requires both particular and peculiar skills. Dogs do not compete with each other, per se, but are judged on how they adhere to a specific set of breed standards, as established by the American Kennel Club.
“It comes down to the dog having the most virtues as described for its breed,” Sturz said. “They must also convey the essence of their race in behavior, character, and transportation.”
With 209 different types of dogs competing in the program, Sturz needs to be intimately familiar with the breed standards of all of them. So he has been studying, especially looking at endless pictures of dogs in books and magazines and online, to cement in his head a template of each breed, a kind of Platonic ideal.
Regular people who see dog shows are often based on their favorite dogs: showy golden retrievers, for example, elegant Afghan dogs or silly shepherd dogs, without realizing that these qualities do not necessarily count as winning virtues in the eyes of the judge. .
“There are some races that lend themselves to a show atmosphere,” Sturz said. “They are more active, more striking, more elegant and have more presence. But what we are looking for is what the race is supposed to convey. Some breeds are supposed to be more reserved, quiet, and majestic, and that speaks to both a judge and the dog that is there wagging its tail and jumping up and down.
In real life, Sturz is the superintendent of the Valley Stream 24 school district on Long Island. But he is also a lifelong dog enthusiast who has been attending dog shows for 50 years and judges 32 of them, including Westminster. This is the first time he has awarded the best show.
When he spoke, Sturz still didn’t know that one of the dogs in the final would be a French bulldog and therefore possibly a personal favorite, since he has one, named Emmet, at home. (She also has a bull terrier, Lola.)
But he pledged to judge as a neutral observer, without fear or favoritism, no matter what he faced.
“Dogs are works of art,” he said. “I love all races.”