How do you judge the success of eventers?

MrClean · July 2014

I'm curious as to what people consider when they look for a "successful" event dog. I've seen a lot of dogs being bragged about for being National or whatever, but when you look at their numbers they have a wps record of 2% or something... Then I've seen dogs that consistently place 4th or 5th and have high earnings but no wps, and dogs that are just amazing but are so specialized that they haven't been shown much (so if you just look at their numbers they'd look like a low scoring dog). What is the general consensus on VP these days? Is National good enough, even if the dog is only a National because it's been in that many events? Is earnings enough, even if the dog never seems to come in 3rd or better? Do you look for some combination? If you look for wps%, what do you think is decent... 30%…50%?

Frostbight8 · July 2014

For some reason, earnings have never been a factor that I consider when looking at an event dog, unless it's some record high achievement like 20 mill. I've always considered a good event dog to be one with a solid WPS percentage/record. Other than that, I hate doing math, so I don't usually take the time to calculate a WPS percentage, even though I basically get myself halfway there anyway. I just add up all the WPS and then compare it to the amount of events the dog has been in. When I do that, I typically like to see that the dog placed in roughly half of the completed events. That's just my two cents. I'm interested in seeing what other people think!

Para Darkwater · July 2014

I use to look solely at the WPS% when I first started eventing. I even retired some dogs because they just weren't placing 1-3 despite their otherwise good earnings. Now with most of the events scoring wonky its hard, in my opinion, to get a really amazing or even decent event dog just looking at the WPS record. A lot of events seem to be random and a lot of dogs that should do great just aren't. So now I look at a combination. I still like to see a dog with a good WPS record but I also look at the earnings to see if they are doing decently in general. I still think a dog that is coming in 4th consistently and say has a 0/0/0 is an overall better eventer than say one who maybe has placed 1-3rd a few times but then bombs the rest of the time. I know I use to be really critical of my dogs and when calculating the WPS% I would get really disappointed. I've got some that even with good earnings I still don't consider great eventers because they only have a 20-30% placing. For me in this wonky event scoring time if a dog has about 50% WPS it's a good eventer and usually it will have good earnings too. As for their event level that's not a huge factor for me unless they have the event record and earnings to back it up.

FlyTM · July 2014

I judge a dog on its "wins/places/shows (# of competitions)" because any dog can get to International if you enter it into how many events, even if it has 0/0/300 places, to me 826 / 581 / 387 (2520) is better because that dog is winning me more cash, than losing me cash if its placing 1/20/300 (2520) The cash to me depends on the event, if your eventing that dog in 1000$ events than if it places first it will win more than being in a 100$ event.

Cherokeezbaby · July 2014

I go off of w/p/s divided by number of competitions to get a solid percentage of how well of an eventer they are. I also like to enter the dogs into every event for like two days to see which event(s) the dog does well in and then enter the dog in strictly that (or those) event(s). I figure, why waste the money on entering a dog in 4 events for $4000 total just to lose that money? However, now that I have been noticing the glitches in the events, I tend to just like it when a dog earns the money I spent on the event back. I find it harder and harder to find a dog's perfect event(s) due to the glitch when the show runs. I could enter a dog in the same event with the same dogs as competitors and all of the dogs end up in different places each time; last place becomes the winner, ect.

MrClean · July 2014

So it seems for the most part that you guys like to see that a dog has a good wps% ... I'm kind of like you Para in that I like to see a strong wps but at the same time I know it's hard with the way events are scoring. Especially with rescued/second hand eventers, sometimes the dogs just aren't put into the events that would best suit them so their wps doesn't reflect their potential. Of course, a seasoned eventer (regional+) will attract me more than a newbie. Just because, if a dog was entered into four racing events and came in 1st every time it would have 100% wps and great earnings to only be a Junior, but at the same time for all you know those events could have been filled with imports or something... I do the same thing Cherokee. I'll train my dog based on its stats and then enter it into every event it's trained for. You can't just look at numbers you have to test it out to get an accurate read on it! Especially with events doing strange things, my dogs have really been surprising me here lately! Good to know how everyone thinks

Howdy, Stranger!

How do you judge the success of eventers?

Comments