FCI in transition

We are living in a changeable world. Politically the last 25 years have been characterised by very big changes: New countries have emerged, others have dissolved and new state formations have appeared.

This has of course affected the FCI and our whole organisation. We have become many more members and before long we will probably pass a total of 100 full member countries, associated countries and contract partners. And not many years ago we were “only” 70 countries.
As most people will know, our statutes are based on the principle “one country – one vote” and this principle will surely be challenged in the coming years, as the rapid increase in the number of members with a lot of quite small kennel clubs is diluting the influence of the large and middle-sized countries; those countries that pay for almost the entire running of the FCI (the 5 largest contributors pay more than 1/3 of the total income of the FCI).

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Jørgen Hindse
FCI Agility World Champion 2013 in Johannesburg

This year’s World Championship was a special one in the long history of the FCI World championships. It was the first one outside of Europe. It was a pity that not all Kennel-Clubs, who belong to the “Agility World” did send participants, but I am proud of the teams who travel the long way to Johannesburg, only those who have been there became part of the highest Agility event of the year.

We had a wonderful opening ceremony, with the spirit of South African music and dancers.

© Uwe Dybski
Course drawing

To be crowned World Champion is an honour, but this title can only be won after a heated competition, after a huge amount of training and after demonstrating a fantastic positive attitude. All handlers who stepped to the startline with their dogs showed both the emotional as well as the physical commitment to their dogs.
We saw wonderful runs, fair sportsmanship, a wonderful atmosphere between all handlers, wherever they come from. All starters give the very best they could.

© Uwe Dybski
Winning team Large - agility run: 1st Germany, 2nd Switzerland and 3rd Austria

We had courses created by the South African judge Gawie Faul, courses which Europeans are not very familiar with, but they managed. The courses created by the international judge from Norway, Harald Schjelderup, made the starters feel more comfortable.

The president of the KUSA, Greg Eva, and the chairman of the KUSA, Mr Thomas staid all four days at the WC and followed all runs and were astonished because of the team work between handler and dog and the high speed the teams managed the courses.

© Uwe Dybski
Winners - Individual - Jumping run Large : 1st Liska Radovan (CZ), 2nd Helmut Paulik (AT), 3rd Philipp Müller-Schnick (DE)

The KUSA and the organising committee of the WC with all volunteers did a lot of work in advance and during the WC, for that I would like to thank all of them.

Helmut Paulik, a member of the Austrian team, will never forget this WC, he made in front of all starters and spectators (and we had thousands of spectators) a proposal to his girl friend Christina Brunner singing a love-song and asking her to marry him; she said “yes” and you could see tears in the eyes of half of the people around them. That was not the only success he could be happy about. He is the individual World Champion in category Large, he had excellent runs.

These are the World Champions:
Team Large : Switzerland
Team Medium : Switzerland
Team Small : Germany

Individual
Category Large : Helmut Paulik (Austria)
Category Medium : David Molina Gimeno (Spain)
Category Small : Conny Spengler (Switzerland)

Winning the title of Agility World Champion is the highest sporting achievement, which will remain with the winner forever.

© Uwe Dybski
The German Team with the African dancers

Last but not least I hope we can keep the spirit of this special World Champions for the next one in Luxembourg 2014.

Christa Bremer
President of the FCI Agility Commission

Copyright: Eugene Marais