The Fédération Equestre International outlined changes to the North American League rules for the 2020-2021 FEI Dressage World Cup competition season.

The number of allotted World Cup qualifying competitions will be reduced to 10 throughout Canada, the United States and Mexico. The U.S. will be allocated between six and eight events, Canada will have one to three and Mexico will have one. Events will be limited to three per organizing committee and have a minimum prize money requirement of $5,000 in the relevant currency.

The scoring system will transition from percentages to points given for the top 10 placings. Bonus points will be added in any class with more than eight competitors.

The chart from p. 4 of the updated North American League rules shows the new allocation of points.

“The idea behind this is to really try to help some of the CDI-Ws,” said former U.S. Dressage Federation President and current U.S. Dressage Youth Coach George Williams during the CDI Organizers meeting at the 2019 Adequan USDF Annual Convention in Savannah, Georgia, Dec. 4-7.

“[Changing] percentages to points should be beneficial to organizers,” Williams continued. “We’re trying to generate more interest in CDI-Ws because more competitors will have a shot, in some ways. We want to encourage athletes to compete in other venues and encourage some different athletes to compete. When this idea was first put forward, what we did is we had a meeting in Wellington [Florida] with riders from Canada, Mexico and the U.S. We’re trying to reach a compromise between organizers and athletes.”