I also do the table that shows the judge assignments and running order for the premium after figuring out the running order while that is all fresh in my mind. I’m not an Office master and found that presenting that information in Word, which is what I use for the premium, to be difficult. Instead, I use Excel to create a table, save it as an image, and insert that image into the premium. I just find it much easier to scale the image to fit the space. Here’s the final image for this event, ready for use in the premium.
ASFA requires that the judge assignments be presented in alphabetical order of the breeds. That’s done as though the breed were spelled out in its entirety, so Irish Wolfhound before Italian Greyhound and Silken Windhound before Sloughi. I use my abbreviations for clarity and haven’t been dinged by ASFA Scheduling yet for doing so. I put Limited and Single at the end. The judges are also ordered alphabetically, by last name and then first name, though I only put enough of the name to distinguish them. ASFA is also quite particular about the symbol that goes in the box to indicate an assignment. These three judges are all from the United States and single judging the breed, so “S” will do, and I just need to make certain that there is exactly one and only one “S” in each column of each day.
Because the running order cannot be inferred from the table, I place it below the table each day and use highlighting to call attention to it for the exhibitors.
Quiz time. Why does the judging panel for a weekend usually consist of 3 judges?
In the ASFA running rules, Chapter III Judging, section 2 prohibits a solo judge from judging the same breed on consecutive days, and section 3 prohibits a judge from judging their own hounds. Thus, if a judge One intends to enter their own hound on consecutive days, some combination of judge Two and judge Three will be necessary to judge that hound's breed on the two days of a typical weekend of lure coursing.
Incase an issue arises and a judge cannot make it to the trial and you are not overworking one judge. Furthermore since most judges run dogs, if you only had two judges and one calls off there wouldn’t be a judge for that breed.