© Ger Wolvers

Renate Wagner (AT) with her Labrador Retriever Amira von der Kranenbitter Klamm, placed 10th with 180 points.

This year’s FCI WC for Tracking Dogs was held from 18-04 until 22-04-2012 in the surroundings of Velten, Germany. Place of action, a big green reserve North of Velten. The type of terrains were worth this yearly event.
The organiser, the German VDH, did a very good job and we have to thank all the people who worked with Mrs Christa Bremer, vice president of the VDH.
A special word of thank has to go Karl Heinz and Helene Zeidler and to all those who participated in the organisation of this big event. We also have to thank the mayoress of Velten, who was our host for this 2012 FCI World Championship, she had a special word of welcome in all official FCI languages and also even for the participants from Russia in the Russian language.

© Jurgen Rixen

On the podium; Winner and 2012 FCI World Champion: Marco Dreyer (DE) with his German Shepherd Erk vom Waliboer Land, 194 points; 2nd: Rainer Holm (FI) with his German Sheperd Jabina Oswald, 188 points; 3rd: Kurt Popp (DE) with his German Shepherd Omana vom Leipheimer Moor, 188 points.

Supervisor during this event was Urs Meyer from Switzerland. Judges: Aad Broekhuizen from The Netherlands and Juan José Pérez López from Spain. The stewards were: Wilfried Schaepermeier and Richard Strauss both from Germany. This group did a very good job and we have to thank them for doing so.

© Jurgen Rixen

Marco Dreyer and his German Shepherd Erk vom Waliboer Land on the track with judge Juan José Pérez López.

We had 42 participants from 25 different countries.
Each participant and his dog had to work out two tracks, one per day. Each track, laid by a tracklayer, was about 1,800 paces long, had several angles, sharp angles and also half a circle. On the track, the tracklayer set, according to the rulebook, 7 little articles. Half an hour before the handler and his dog started to work out the track, the track was crossed twice (on two different places) by another tracklayer.
The dog had to follow, precisely as possible, the first laid track, indicate the articles and had to ignore the two cross-tracks. The time given to do this job was 45 minutes.
Per track, the team, handler and his dog, can score up to 100 points and the team with the most points after two tracks is of course the winner. It will be the FCI World Champion of that year.
This year’s winner was Marco Dreyer (DE) with his German Shepherd, Erk vom Waliboer Land with a total score of 194 points. Second was Raine Holm (FI) with his German Shepherd, Jabina Oswald, with a total score of 188 points and the third place was for Erwin Patzen (CH) with is German Shepherd Aly vom Hause Patzen, with a total score of 188 points.

© Ger Wolvers

Sergey Zhirkevich with his German Shepherd Brit z L'ubovho Dvora in his first track (87 points) placed 37th with judge Aad Broekhuizen (NL) and tracklayer Sophie Hoffman (DE).

In the Team Competition, also Germany was no 1, with a total score of 382 points.
From the 42 participants 24 succeeded. 1 was excellent, 11 were very good, 10 were good and 2 were satisfactory. We could see the work of German Shepherds, Belgian Shepherd Dog Malinois and Groenendael, Berger de Brie, Dutch Shepherd Dogs and a Labrador retriever.

Frans Jansen