After the Westminster crowd gathered to watch dogs sprint through a labyrinth of jumps, turns and ramps, the premise was simple: each run depended on the dog doing the course correctly while the handler delivered the information needed to keep the team on track. In Saturday’s competition at the Westminster Kennel Club’s milestone 150th dog show, handlers said success came from the combination of training habits, careful strategy and constant communication between canine and person.
Amber McCune, a veteran handler from Bedford, New Hampshire, guided her border collie Prove-It to a win, and she described the working relationship in terms of mutual reliance. “We’re really codependent to each other,” McCune said after the victory, adding that the bond helped make her feel “grateful that I can be his person.”
The agility “conversation” is built on signals that go beyond what many viewers may picture as spoken commands. Handlers can call out cues such as “tunnel!” and “jump!” during the run, but the communication also includes physical guidance, with handlers aware that dogs can pick up subtle changes in posture and movement. Emily Klarman, last year’s Westminster-winning handler, described agility as “a big conversation that we’re having with our dogs,” and handlers said they interpret the dogs’ own body language as they work through the course.
McCune and other handlers also emphasized that the sport requires careful positioning and planning. Trials require teams to complete the obstacle sequence quickly, and scores factor in both time and accuracy, with penalty points for mistakes such as a dog bounding off a seesaw or ramp without placing a foot in the required end section. To teach that precision, handlers described training methods that start with simpler habits and then tighten them toward the competition layout, including having a dog walk onto a ground pad, putting that pad at the end of an obstacle, and later removing the pad once the accuracy is learned.
Different jump situations can also require different approaches, particularly when dogs need to change direction tightly after landing. Handlers said the course itself cannot be gamed with outside incentives because agility trials do not allow leashes, treats or toys on the course, which shifts the emphasis toward the fun of the game and the reward after the run. Cindy McGovern, awaiting a run Saturday with her golden retriever Georgie, described the post-performance reward as a toy stuffed with foods such as steak, meatballs or hot dogs.
Within that framework, handlers said memorizing the route is a major part of preparation. They must map complex pathways through roughly 20 obstacles, and at Westminster handlers do not get course maps until the morning of the competition. Handlers then have a few minutes to walk the course and consider questions such as whether to cross ahead of or behind the dog on different turns.
Klarman also tied performance to the emotional exchange between handlers and dogs, saying dogs can tell whether handlers are “really excited and pumped up” or disappointed. She said she tried not to show those feelings after Vanish did not excel on a seesaw obstacle in last year’s Westminster finals.
Beyond individual teams, the story of Westminster agility is also about how the sport has changed the show. Westminster, widely considered the United States’ most illustrious dog show, added agility in 2014, introducing what handlers described as a faster-paced and more athletic element to the traditional lineup. Agility is open to mixed-breed dogs, and the competition has produced winners from outside purebred categories as well, including a border collie-papillon mix named Nimble, which won in 2024 and finished among the top five performances Saturday.
In addition to the main results, Westminster recognized top mixed-breed competition with a special award, won by Iron Man, a papillon-whippet-border collie mix, with handler Merritt Speagle. Speagle stepped in after owner Carol Boggess sprained a calf muscle the week before, and Boggess said Speagle delivered “a phenomenal job. … He’s a lot to handle.”
Klarman, a dog fan since she was a toddler who entered canine sports as a preteen and later pursued a nursing degree before shifting to a career with dogs, described last year’s Westminster win as a capstone. “It really meant so much to showcase her and let the world know how special she is,” Klarman recalled, noting that this year she was cheering from the sidelines for her boyfriend, Peter Wirth, and his Pembroke Welsh corgi, named Welly, as the pair made the finals at New York’s Javits Center. Klarman and Vanish stayed home Saturday because Vanish’s first litter of puppies is due next week.