TAMPA – This past weekend was the Tampa Bay Leather and Fetish Pride featuring not only the Tampa Bay Leather Sir & boy Contest but also the first ever International Puppy Contest. The Midwest was well represented with many groups wearing their colors and Christopher “Tyger” Roth (Bad Dog Bar & Grill in St Louis, Midwest Puppy Contest Producer) assuming his role of Associate Producer of International Puppy
The weekend itself was held at the Flamingo Resort in St Petersburg, FL and while it was originally an older Howard Johnsons, they have done numerous renovations and turned it into a Gay resort destination. With Leather and Fetish Pride being held there it was nice to be in a very friendly environment. The groups organizing had everything from demo sites across the property to both indoor and outdoor dungeons.Friday consisted of some great time socializing and checking out the vendors that are there at the Flamingo and those that came in for the weekend and Opening Ceremonies for the weekend including drawing contestant numbers for both contests. After the kickoff, the Meet & Greet was held and everyone got a chance to meet not only all the contestants but the judges as well.
Saturday was demo and contest day. Throughout the day there were a variety of demos held from everything from flogging to food play to Puppy 101. If you didn’t find something of someone to entertain you, you weren’t looking hard enough! The interviews were also held for all the contestants.
Contest Time – The event started off with introductions and performances by some of the local talent. Interestingly enough, both contests shared the same slate of judges and were presented together. It was actually a very well done meshing and it kept things moving well though the evening and didn’t drag on.
The Tampa Bay Leather Sir & boy Contest had 5 contestants, 3 Sirs and 2 boys who really did a great job representing themselves and their communities. At the end of the evening, Sir Danny Catalon and boy max were the winners.
The International Puppy Competition was a fierce competition of 5 pups – Pup Gadget from Seattle, Pup Axel from Virginia, Pup Lucky from Ft Lauderdale, Pup Shy from Tampa and Pup Jaeger from Tampa. While it was the contest’s first year, it ran smoothly and the judges did amazing and did not have an easy job as all the pups were top notch. At the end of the night the scoring was amazingly close with only a couple points separating each pup but the victor was Pup Axel. Also during the evening, the Bill (Trooper) Boyd “Best in Show” Memorial Award to the puppy they feel best conducts themselves as a puppy in and out of pup gear was presented to Pup Gadget for all his hard work and leadership not only in being one of the founders of the Seattle Pups and Handlers but also reaching out to others in the Puppy Community helping them start their own groups and events.
Sunday morning was the Victory Bunch and during the course of the morning, International Puppy made several announcements including presenting the weekend’s International Puppy “Good Puppy” award to Pup Tripp from DC. The IPC’s “Good Puppy of the Year” was announced and the winner was Pup Brue who has long been a mentor in the community and has always been willing to lend a paw when needed and also holds his yeary Woof Camps. It was also announced that Pup Gadget would be assuming the role of IPC’s U.S. Liaison overseeing and assisting with puppy contests and events that are part of the International Puppy Family now that Tyger/Woof Roth has assumed the role of Associate Producer.
All in all it was an amazing weekend and all are encouraged to give it a try next year!
