The Red Angus Association of America (RAAA) recently handed out its GridMaster Awards at the 2007 National RAAA Convention held in Dodge City, Kansas, September 26 � 29. The recipients received the awards their superior cattle's carcass qualities had earned them at the historic Dodge House Hotel and Convention Center. Century Feeders of Goodland, Kansas earned an amazing four GridMaster Awards by feeding different sets of cattle owned by different producers. Two sets were owned by John Boroff of Danial, Wyo. and two sets were owned by Wedel Red Angus of Leoti, Kansas and McIntire Ranch of Jordan, Mont.
The GridMaster Award is given by the Red Angus Association of America (RAAA) to acknowledge those producers, owners or feeders that produce superior cattle that exceed the following characteristics when harvested through the Angus America Grid:
1) Minimum 30 head lot size.
2) Minimum 80 percent Choice or higher.
3) Maximum 7.5 percent YG 4's.
4) Minimum Grid Score of 100.
The Grid Score is calculated using the overall performance of the lot and accounts for the percentage premium products obtained and the percentage of Yield Grade 1's and 2's stamped, as well as the overall Choice and Yield Grade 4 percentages. The cattle are marketed on the Angus America Grid at participating Cargill plants.
GridMaster cattle are selected from the Red Angus Feeder Cattle Certification Program (FCCP), a USDA Process Verified Program, now in its second decade of providing genetic traceability to Angus bloodlines, source verification to ranch of origin and now group age verification. The GridMaster winners represent some of the nearly 100,000 head of feeder cattle that are marketed through the Red Angus program annually. One set of cattle fed out at Century Feeders graded 90 percent Choice or better with 82.5 percent Yield Grade 1's and 2's, a grid score of 137.67 and earned an average grid premium of $79.02.
