ph: Tori Repole for NF.
At the last FEI General Assembly, held on August 26, 2017, during the European Championships in Gothenburg, Sweden, the International Jumping Riders Club (IJRC) voted unanimously to a Board’s proposal that serves to better regulate the invitation and ranking point system for top-level shows. The voting was witnessed by more than 150 people, including FEI President Ingmar De Vos, the FEI Secretary General Sabrina Ibanez, and various FEI managers. The proposals go as followed:
• Limit the possibility [for riders] to earn points to one time per day at each show ( under discussion)
• Ranking points for CSI5* classes will only be earned at events that respect the following percentage of invitations:
– 60% of the riders entered in the show [are] in descending order of the rankings (including home riders)
– 20% [are decided by] the Home federation (NF)
– 20% [ are decided by] the organizing comity (OC)
The IJRC is responsible for the show jumping rankings rules (except the commercial rights), and the Club will only accept exceptions for the FEI Longines Nations Cups and the FEI Longines World Cup of Show Jumping, two historical circuits where the participants are selected by team chef d’equipes of the National Federation.
No other exception will be made, and the remaining circuits will have to follow this rule of 20% invitations maximum.
Too many pay cards could kill the sport and the futures of the most talented athletes. Also, it has to be considered that ranking points are important for qualification to the Olympic Games, and we only want the deserved riders qualified.
Olympian Steve Guerdat of Switzerland and member of the Board, added: “Our goal is to only support and distribute points to shows that present good sport, not shows that are open to athletes who have the option of paying to compete. Therefore, we are doing our best to find the best solutions to achieve our goal, as we have to protect the real sport.”
It is hoped that the National Federations will be able to quickly choose the right path for the benefit of the sport.
– via the International Jumping Riders Club.