Why a niche sport where big dogs bite people took off in Sacramento suburbs

There are many reasons a person might hesitate to partake in French ring, a sport where dogs are judged on their agility, obedience and ability to provide protection.

There are the costs involved with traveling to competitive events around the United States and in France, where the sport was invented.

There’s the friction with animal rights enthusiasts — and the fact that part of the sport involves judging dogs on how well they bite people.

“You have to be a diehard to want to do something like this,” said Ari Fleishman, president of the North American Ring Association, or NARA.

And yet, quietly, the greater Sacramento region is a hotbed for French ring, with around half the clubs in California. While some of it could be due to the fact that the area is temperate enough to allow year-round practice in a sport that demands heavy training, there is also a passion evident in the people who gather locally to do French ring.

From French fields to the Sacramento suburbs

French ring originated more than a century ago. It was “developed in France as a way to accurately test potential breeding stock for working ability,” according to Southwestern Ontario And Regional Ringsport. An article from a Washington state newspaper notes that the sport had been introduced to the U.S. in 1986.

In both France and America, French ring remains a niche sport. Fleishman said a few hundred people participate in the sport in the U.S. while around 3,000 do so in France.

“If you went to Paris and you asked someone about ring, they would have no idea what you’re talking (about),” Fleishman said.

He described French ring as an “extremely unpopular sport that gets slightly less unpopular.” Factors that limit French ring’s popularity, he said, include the scarcity of trainers for the sport in the U.S.

“I live in Chicago, the closest drive for someone who I would work with is five hours,” Fleishman said. He used to make that drive. And once a month in the past, he would also fly to Jacksonville, Florida to work with a trainer there.

The sport can be expensive, too.

“It’s like, if your kid plays hockey, it’s just going to cost a fortune and that’s it,” Fleishman said.

Animal rights activists oppose French ring

Animal rights activists can also sometimes cause issues for people who partake in French ring, though Fleishman dismissed this as something not limited to the sport. He also said dog safety is prioritized in competitions. “The number one job of the judge is the safety of the dog,” Fleishman said.

Generally, Belgian Malinois dogs compete in the sport, though it isn’t necessarily limited to the breed, with German shepherds sometimes taking part.

“These dogs are bred for this, like sled dogs are bred to do that,” said Spencer Bowman, president of Prestige Ringsport. “These Malinois, these German shepherds, they’re bred to be police dogs, military dogs. If they don’t have something like this to do, that’s when they get aggressive, they have problems.”

Adam Limoges, a Newcastle-based trainer and owner of How 2 Dog LLC doesn’t do French ring, as he said he didn’t care for the type of protection training the sport espouses. He knows trainers who do French ring, though. Limoges said the dog training world is very niche, with people who can swear by French ring or Belgian ring or Mondioring.

“I would dare to say they’re almost cultish,” Limoges said. “Like, if you belong to that group, you think yours is the end-all, be-all and the other ones aren’t worth a grain of salt.”

French ring attracts driven and intense competitors, both among canines and humans. And sometimes, for whatever reason, things can go sideways.

Bowman is currently serving a three-year ban from NARA, with an option to petition for reinstatement after 18 months. Bowman said he had been vice president of the group and was banned after challenging the president. A petition that Marissa Bowman, Spencer’s wife, organized to end her husband’s ban had drawn 42 signatures as Friday afternoon.

In contrast to how Spencer Bowman characterized his ban, Fleishman said that Bowman caused a disruption at a competitive trial event. Fleishman declined to comment at length, citing a pending lawsuit from Bowman.

Rise of French ring in Sacramento region

What makes French ring a thing in the Sacramento area?

Limoges said the amount of dog-training businesses between the Bay Area and Sacramento helps explain the sport’s popularity here, as does open land that can be found in the region.

“We’ve got space and property and not crowded areas,” Limoges said. “So people can get together with 50 dogs on a field that are causing barking and all kinds of noise and stuff and people aren’t complaining about it, because it’s farm area.”

Bowman’s Roseville French ring training facility sits on a large, fairly desolate parcel near Denio’s. He said one neighbor has had complaints, not wanting a dog facility in the neighborhood, though things are otherwise fairly mellow.

An ecosystem of training centers in the region also provides options and people who can work together. A club list on the NARA website gives a rundown of places in the region that do ring-related sports.

Aside from Prestige, which is listed for its former location in Wilton and Outkast, there is RBC ringsport in Vacaville, West Coast Working Dog Club in Grass Valley and Lodi’s Bay Area Ring Club.

“I think part of it, to be honest, is weather,” Bowman said. “You can train year round here.”

A visit to a French ring practice

It was a rainy morning, Feb. 19, but the dogs training at Prestige Ringsport in Roseville didn’t seem to notice.

The canines, JagerMeister and Sub-Zero were training for French ring, with the sport testing obedience, agility and protection. There were hits with a bamboo clatter stick, which projects a rattling sound. There was also jumping and bite training, where dogs doing French ring are prompted to bite a person wearing a protective suit.

Bowman and Juan Portillo, president of Elk Grove-based Outkast Ringsport traded off on training that morning. They have been training together in recent years in part because French ring requires both a trainer and someone to put on a suit and volunteer to be bitten.

Different things can hook people on French ring. For Bowman and Fleishman, part of what drew them was the sport’s biting.

“I’d never really seen dogs do protection-type work before and that part was super-interesting,” Bowman said.

Fleishman said that he’d gotten a French bulldog that was overly aggressive and took it to a bite class in an attempt to rein in its behavior. “I saw the type of dog that competes in this type of sport and I was just blown away,” Fleishman said. “And I’m like, ‘I gotta give up golf and take this up as a my new hobby.’”

Portillo is a former IT worker who now makes his living as a dog trainer, running JPK9 Academy. He’s been doing French ring for about five years and for him, the sport’s draw is about what it can do to bring trainers and dogs together.

“The relationship that gets created with the dog is, I think, far beyond a relationship that you can create with another human,” Portillo said.

Then there’s travel, a necessity both for training and for competitions and something that can be a family affair.

Marissa Bowman said the family – including their preschool-aged son and another child on the way – has traveled to places like Florida and New York and can spend upwards of a month in France, where the sport was invented and international competitions are held.

“For us, it’s been a really cool family experience to be able to travel the world and take our dogs and do that kind of stuff,” she said.

Bowman also owns Prestige K9 and Prestige Protection Dogs and has a dog boarding facility that operates directly adjacent to his French ring practice field in Roseville.

At the time Spencer Bowman spoke to The Bee, his family was preparing to move to the Dallas area in early March. Bowman said that while he planned to launch a business in Texas, he also intended to keep his Roseville business going. His plan was to come out from Texas once or twice a month for a week or two at a time.

The results of French ring

One of Bowman’s employees, Melissa Gelbond said she found French ring “incredibly detail-oriented” and great for people wanting to be perfectionists.

“You’ll never be perfect, but there’s always something more that you could do and you can always be better,” Gelbond said.

All of the work culminates with competitions, Bowman’s favorite part of doing French ring along with the sport’s complexity.

“When we trial our dogs, we get on the field for 45 minutes,” said Bowman, who won championships for Ring III in 2022 and 2023. “Usually for a Ring III routine, there’s no equipment. You can’t have a leash on, can’t have a collar on, you can’t have anything on the dog. And for 45 minutes, you have to keep control of them.”

While Limoges doesn’t partake in French ring himself, he encouraged people to approach the sport with an open mind.

“The dogs do amazing things,” Limoges said. “And if they’re trained properly, you can train them to do anything you want.”