Half the field spent $309,000 on Kandy Cane. The winning herd spent $92,000 on the cow who outscored her.
Austin Yoder won Fantasy Exhibitor© 2026 with 246 points. His herd didn’t include Grand Champion Eixdale Pwrup Alongside, and it didn’t include Lovhill Sidekick Kandy Cane, the most expensive animal on the board.
Instead, the money went where the points were. Md-Locustcrest P Zuriniah cost $64,000 and scored 38. Altona Lea Unix Herminie cost $92,000 and scored 34. Walk-Era Eye Candy Rebel cost $110,000 and scored 28. He also took two write-ins, Donacin Delta-Lambda Rain and Jacobs Lambda Baz-ET, and both scored. He did all of it with $115,000 of his $1.2 million budget unspent.
Reid Barkey of Altona Lea finished two points back. Two points is one placing in one heifer class.
Final Top 10
| Place | Name | Farm | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Austin Yoder | 246 | |
| 2 | Reid Barkey | Altona Lea | 244 |
| 3 | Ivan Garcia Amarelle | Ganaderia O Rubio | 240 |
| 4 | Seth Johnston | Maplevue Farms | 237 |
| 5 | Grant Armstrong | Armcrest | 235 |
| 6 | Matt Forestell | 234 | |
| 7 | Tristan Rae | 233 | |
| 8 | Eric Salonen | Mount Elgin | 232 |
| 9 | Keaton Phoenix | 226 | |
| 10 | Devin Coleman | 225 |
Yoder takes home the one-of-a-kind Bullvine Fantasy Exhibitor Champion jacket.
The Winning String
| Class | Pick | Price | Result | Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spring Calf | Winright Major Erica | $50,000 | Did not show | 0 |
| Winter Calf | Blacklilly Direct Lala-ET | $36,000 | 2nd | 9 |
| Fall Calf | Nehls-Donk Best Giddy Up | $56,000 | 3rd | 8 |
| Summer Yearling | Echo Glen Master Irina | $77,000 | Did not show | 0 |
| Spring Yearling | Eastriver DL Carrera 118-ET | $59,000 | 5th | 6 |
| Winter Yearling | Butlerview Glitter Girl-ET | $169,000 | 1st, Junior Champion | 20 |
| Fall Yearling | Appalachian AN Amaretto-ET | $51,000 | Did not show | 0 |
| Junior 2-Year-Old | Walk-Era Eye Candy Rebel | $110,000 | 1st, Reserve Intermediate | 28 |
| Senior 2-Year-Old | Axel Havenofear Camy | $86,000 | 1st | 20 |
| Junior 3-Year-Old | Millen Lambda Amelia-ET | $39,000 | 1st | 20 |
| Senior 3-Year-Old | Md-Locustcrest P Zuriniah | $64,000 | 1st, Intermediate, Reserve Grand | 38 |
| 4-Year-Old | Donacin Delta-Lambda Rain (write-in) | $90,000 | 4th | 9 |
| 5-Year-Old | Jacobs Lambda Baz-ET (write-in) | $106,000 | 3rd | 10 |
| Aged Cow | Altona Lea Unix Herminie | $92,000 | 1st, Reserve Senior, HM Grand | 34 |
| Early-entry bonus | 44 | |||
| Total | $1,085,000 | 246 |
Three of his picks never walked into the ring, and he still won. Five cows — Zuriniah, Herminie, Rebel, Camy and Amelia — delivered 140 points for $391,000, about a third of his budget.
The $92,000 Cow Who Beat the $309,000 One
Kandy Cane was the most popular pick in the contest. Just over half of all entrants put her in their herd, at roughly a quarter of their budget. She came back to Madison without a show in any of the sixteen we tracked this season, and won the Lifetime Milk Production class, which paid 20 points.
Herminie paid 34. She won the Six-Year-Old & Older class, then took Reserve Senior and Honorable Mention Grand behind Alongside and Zuriniah. One entrant in five had her, at less than a third of Kandy Cane’s price.
Alongside, at $278,000, was the single biggest scorer on the board. Her class win, Senior Champion and Grand Champion added up to 40 points. About a quarter of the field had her. Only two of the top 10 did.
What the Top 10 Had in Common
The top strings didn’t win by finding the champions. They won by getting the class winners in the middle of the board:
- Axel Havenofear Camy, the Winter Senior Two-Year-Old winner, was in all 10.
- Butlerview Glitter Girl-ET was in 9.
- Altona Lea Unix Herminie, Walk-Era Eye Candy Rebel and Millen Lambda Amelia-ETwere each in 8.
- Md-Locustcrest P Zuriniah was in 7.
- Kandy Cane and Alongside were in two each.
Camy cost $86,000 and Amelia $39,000. Neither was a headline pick, and both won their classes.
The Ghosts Split the Field
Our preview argued that readers were betting on the cows who hadn’t shown all year, and it called that the whole story of the show. Friday settled it both ways.
The ghost picks that paid:
- Zuriniah had no 2026 record in the shows we tracked. She came back to win the Senior Three-Year-Olds, Intermediate Champion and Reserve Grand: 38 points for $64,000.
- Micheret South Believe, the cheapest Expo class winner on the board at $22,000, stood second to her in the same class, worth 15 points. One entrant in five had her.
- Kandy Cane came back and won her class.
The ghost picks that never showed:
- West-Adub Lambda Sadie, last year’s Reserve Grand, was the third-most-popular pick in the contest. Nearly a third of entrants took her, and she didn’t show.
- Our-Favorite Endzone-ET was in nearly a quarter of strings. She didn’t show either.
- Echo Glen Master Ivy, Junior Champion here in 2025, was in one string in ten. She didn’t come back.
The cows who did show, and were on form, mostly delivered:
- Jacobs Chief Dina, Grand Champion of Midwest Summer National five weeks earlier, won the Four-Year-Olds and took Honorable Mention Senior. She scored 26.
- Crisdhome TStruck Abudahbi, Grand Champion at Northeast Fall, was fourth in the Junior Three-Year-Olds. Millen Lambda Amelia-ET won the class, and readers had backed Amelia over her all along.
The Perfect Herd
With the results in hand, the best possible $1.2 million herd scores 290 show points. Add the full 44-point early-entry bonus and it reaches 334.
| Class | Perfect pick | Price | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spring Calf | Ms Venmo Junie-ET (write-in) | $25,000 | 10 |
| Winter Calf | Monoak Master Precious (write-in) | $30,000 | 18 |
| Fall Calf | Overlake Master Dylan | $47,000 | 10 |
| Summer Yearling | Ladys Lov Hulu Lovee-ET (write-in) | $40,000 | 10 |
| Spring Yearling | Marfloacres Major Marino | $84,000 | 16 |
| Winter Yearling | Butlerview Glitter Girl-ET | $169,000 | 20 |
| Fall Yearling | Ms Crave Belive Tiffany-ET (write-in) | $51,000 | 10 |
| Junior 2-Year-Old | Walk-Era Eye Candy Rebel | $110,000 | 28 |
| Senior 2-Year-Old | Mosnang Grinch U R A Mean One (write-in) | $61,000 | 26 |
| Junior 3-Year-Old | Millen Lambda Amelia-ET | $39,000 | 20 |
| Senior 3-Year-Old | Md-Locustcrest P Zuriniah | $64,000 | 38 |
| 4-Year-Old | Smygwatys Lambda Erica (write-in) | $90,000 | 10 |
| 5-Year-Old | Eixdale Pwrup Alongside | $278,000 | 40 |
| Aged Cow | Altona Lea Unix Herminie | $92,000 | 34 |
| Total | $1,180,000 | 290 |
Six of the 14 perfect picks are write-ins, and four of those — Junie, Precious, Tiffany and the Grinch — weren’t in a single string. That’s the design working: the board priced the favourites, and the room to win was in the animals nobody had on a list.
The perfect herd doesn’t take Jacobs Chief Dina, even though she won the Four-Year-Olds. At $272,000 she doesn’t fit alongside Alongside, so the money goes to Smygwatys Lambda Erica, third in the class, as a $90,000 write-in.
No entrant had more than six of the 14 perfect picks. Yoder had five, and his 202 show points came to 70% of perfect.
How It Was Scored
Every pick scored on her placing in the Expo class she actually showed in. Heifer classes paid 10 points for first down to 1 for tenth. Cow classes paid 20, 15 and 10 for the top three, then 9 down to 3.
Junior, Intermediate, Senior and Grand champions added 10 points, reserves 8 and honorable mentions 6. The early-entry bonus paid 4 points for every full day ahead of the deadline. Write-ins scored the same way as board picks.
Each person was ranked on their best string. Placings are from the official World Dairy Expo 2026 Holstein results. Every entrant receives an email with their own result.
Fantasy Exhibitor returns for World Dairy Expo 2027, with new prices and the same $1.2 million budget.
