Results 2019 — Detailed Rankings

2019 Championship — Llandeilo, Wales

The 2019 European Nursery Championship was held on the rolling hills above Llandeilo in Carmarthenshire, Wales, on 15–17 March 2019. A total of 94 dogs from 11 countries competed across two qualification fields, with Welsh Mountain sheep providing a fair but demanding test. Conditions were typical of early spring in Wales — intermittent rain, a brisk westerly wind, and occasional bright spells that transformed the green hillside into a spectacular backdrop for the competition.

Judges for the qualification rounds were Aled Owen (Wales) on Field A and Pietro Lanfranchi (Italy) on Field B. The final was judged jointly by both. The qualification course consisted of an outrun (20 pts), lift (10 pts), fetch through gates (20 pts), drive to two panels (20 pts), pen (10 pts), and a time limit of 12 minutes. The final added a shed (10 pts) and single (10 pts) to the standard elements, with a 15-minute time limit.

Top 15 — Final Rankings

Highlights from the Final

Carole Le Guelec's run with Blackberry Mack was widely regarded as one of the finest nursery performances in recent ENC history. Mack, a smooth-coated black-and-white dog bred in Ireland but trained in Brittany, produced a textbook outrun to the left that kept perfect distance from the sheep. His lift was calm and authoritative, and the fetch through the gates was arrow-straight. The drive was controlled despite a tricky crosswind that had troubled earlier runners, and the pen was completed cleanly in under a minute. In the shed, Le Guelec demonstrated exceptional timing, drawing three sheep away from the group with quiet authority before singling one — a display that drew sustained applause from the gallery.

Kevin Fagan and Sal pushed hard in the final, producing a near-perfect outrun and a powerful drive that demonstrated Sal's natural authority on sheep. A slight hesitation at the pen cost valuable points but the Irish pair still finished in a strong second place. Hendrik Kiemker's Star, running third, was the youngest dog in the final at just over two years old — a remarkable achievement that speaks to the quality of German nursery training in recent years.

The full run sheets and judges' scorecards are available upon request from the ENC committee. Qualification scores for all 94 entries can be found in the official programme booklet distributed at the event.