Cinders, Corpus Christi’s most famous wire-haired dachshund, did not wag her way to the Best in Show title at the 136th Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show Tuesday night.
Malachy, a four-year-old Pekingese that the Associated Press dubbed a “little stump of the dog,” waddled away with that prize, besting Cinders as well as a Dalmatian, German shepherd, Irish setter, a Kerry blue terrier, and a Doberman pinscher. (To be fair, Malachy, pictured above, fits into the silver “Best in Show” cup much more nicely than Cinders would have.) Cinders, however, did win praise from Wall Street Journal‘s Geoff Foster for her “sausage-like swagger.”
“We thought she did awesome,” Cheri Koppenhaver, Cinder’s handler, told the Corpus Christi Caller-Times‘s Steven Alford. “The crowd was really cheering for her.”
The pooch, whose full name is Raydachs Playing With Fire V Gleishorbach SW, won the hound group, the first “female wire-haired dachshund” to ever do so, according to the Houston Chronicle. And the pup will not shy from future competitions—she’ll be back in Texas over the weekend to compete in a dog show in San Marcos, Alford reported.
Other Texas pups to do well at Westminster this year included Suede, a Cavalier King Charles spaniel from Argyle who won an award of merit (and a profile in the Dallas Morning News). Suede’s owner Frankie Hall had two other dogs, Presley and Jackson, in the contest who did not place. “I think Suede was a little overwhelmed with her win, all the people and the excitement,” Hall told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
Handler Cheri Koppenhaver, right, reacts after judge Patricia Laurans, left, declared Cinders, a wirehaired dachshund, the winner of the hound group at the 136th annual Westminster Kennel Club dog show in New York, Monday. (AP Photo Seth Wenig).
