In reference to your article about Mechelen losing its status as a qualifier for the Reem Acra FEI World Cup™ Dressage in the 2012/13 season, the FEI would like to make some comments.
A reduction from today’s 10 qualifiers to a maximum of eight was approved by the FEI General Assembly back in 2009, as part of a programme to make the FEI World Cup™ series more attractive.
We initiated the bid process half a year ago, including informing the existing organisers. Altogether we received 13 bids; all 10 of the existing venues and three new ones. The main criteria for the evaluation, which were circulated beforehand to all Organising Committees of existing World Cup qualifiers and to all National Federations in Western Europe, were:
- Maximum eight CDI-W possible (nine in the case a Final is at one of the chosen events)
- Clash of dates not allowed
- Maximum two events per country
- Spread of events before and after 1 January.
We received more bids for the first part of the season than for the second part, so it became necessary to make a selection. The main issue was the fact that Mechelen is always held immediately after Christmas, and not everybody thinks the date is attractive. An analysis of the participation shows this very clearly. Last season none of the top 10 on the World Ranking list competed, and only three of the top 30. This is clearly weaker than the other bids that were accepted for the 2012/13 season.
As a result, the Dressage Committee decided to make Mechelen a reserve event in case one of the selected events is unable to participate.
The decision was not taken against Mechelen or Belgium in general, but was the result of a fully transparent selection process in which all pros and cons from each event were discussed before the final decision was made.
Photo © Dirk Caremans
Related Link
Mechelen Loses 2012 World Cup Dressage Qualifier