We’re getting to the point where it seems much clearer what the impact is going to be from cancelled trials. At this point we’ve lost 6 weekends of competitions. I’m keeping hopeful that some form of trials might be able to be held again by mid to late May, but even that is pretty questionable at this point, we could be losing 10 weekends of competitions or even more.
10 Weekends wouldn’t be nearly as harmful to qualifications if this happened in December through February which is the slow season, but happening right in the middle of our busiest time of the year is hurting a LOT of people in qualifying for Championships.
We’ve gone over a lot of options for this year, and quite frankly they all will have drawbacks of some form or another.
The best option we can foresee is that we will be dropping qualification requirements for Elite and Pre-Elite completely. This isn’t something we take lightly, and we aren’t thrilled with having to go this route. But there is just no accurate way to guess what dogs could have done in 10 weekends worth of lost competitions during the busiest time of the year.
If you had already qualified using the original qualifications then you must still enter at your qualified level, disregarding the above. You may enter a higher division if you wish, but not a lower one. So if you qualified for Elite, you can NOT enter Pre-Elite.
The Stakes qualifications will be as follows:
Starter Stakes: Dogs must have 150 points in their lifetime in Elite Chances, and a bonus or distance challenge of any value. You may also enter if the dog has attended Starter Stakes in a previous year
Silver Stakes: Dogs must have 250 points in their lifetime in Elite Chances, and two bonus or distance challenges of any value. You may also enter if the dog has attended Silver Stakes in a previous year
Super Stakes: Dogs who have their Purple MODSQUAD may enter. You may also enter if the dog has attended Super Stakes in a previous year
If you had already qualified for stakes using the original qualifications then you must still enter at your qualified level, disregarding the above.
If we reach our entry limit then dogs with a higher level of qualification will take entry priority over dogs with a lower qualification. E.g a dog with 100 points in Elite Regular would take entry priority over a dog with 50 points.