Jack Daniels' / AR Invitational Requests

[dmprantz]

Below is a copy of an eMal I plan to send to contest organizers this year. The goal is to help streamline the process of converting a GC into an invite or a bung. I'm posting a copy here for two reasons: 1) I am hoping that any organizers who frequent this bandwidth will read it and perhaps fulfill the requests themselves, and 2) any one else who thinks they are good requests is welcomed to copy and paste them to an eMail to the organizers of your contests. I filled it out for KCBS, but I would think most any other sanctioning body (IBCA, PNWA, FBA, etc) could be substituted. Please keep in mind that my goal with this is not to tell organizers what to do, but to help them attract teams who seek invites, be as honest as possible so that there are few surprises after a competition, and streamline the actual paperwork process. Thanks.

I'm not sure if you are aware of this or not, but there's been some changes for how qualifiers are handled by the KCBS, the American Royal Invitational, and likely The Jack Daniels' Invitational. Essentially, KCBS has stopped keeping track of the state championship designations, and as a result, The AR as decided that individual organizers are now responsible for informing them of competitions which they feel are qualifiers, based on meats cooked, team count, and for some competitions, the state championship designation.

I am asking all organizers of competitions this year to be prepared for the following. I hope you don't mind this and consider it an attempt to make things better for teams and organizers both:

If as an organizer you plan on offering your competition to The American Royal Invitational, The Jack Daniels' Invitational, or any other invitational competition as a qualifier, please indicate as much on your competition website and/or your competition's team application.

If as an organizer you plan on offering your competition to The American Royal Invitational, The Jack Daniels' Invitational, or any other invitational competition as a qualifier, and you have a state championship proclamation, please have a current digital copy of that proclamation available on your website for download. If your competition is in a state which allows competitions to be state qualifiers without individual proclamations, please indicate as such, though a copy of that "blanket proclamation would also be appreciated. Please try to do this regardless of team capacity or past years' attendance.

At the end of your competition's awards announcements, please have hard copies (one per invitational) of your state championship proclamation and team list available to deliver to your competition's Grand Champion. Additionally, if you are aware of any organizer forms which need to be filled out, please try to have them completed at that time. Competitions with greater than 49 teams may be exempt from the state championship requirement, but if it is available, it would be appreciated if that is available to the team "just in case."

One thing I'm struggling with how to handle: At least one time in the past, a competition was supposed to be a qualifier, but at the conclusion of the event, the organizer, santioning body, or both (I forget which), chose to not submit it as a qualifier. I would love it if organizers would take some stance on that, either guarenteeing that they will not do that, or detailing an exhaustive set of criteria under which the organizer would make that decision. Am I being picky? Yes. Competitions aren't cheap, and teams make decisions based on qualificaiton status. I don't think it's out of line for those teams to expect commitments made by organizers to be followed.

dmp

 

[Smoke'n Ice]

One thing I'm struggling with how to handle: At least one time in the past, a competition was supposed to be a qualifier, but at the conclusion of the event, the organizer, santioning body, or both (I forget which), chose to not submit it as a qualifier. I would love it if organizers would take some stance on that, either guarenteeing that they will not do that, or detailing an exhaustive set of criteria under which the organizer would make that decision. Am I being picky? Yes. Competitions aren't cheap, and teams make decisions based on qualificaiton status. I don't think it's out of line for those teams to expect commitments made by organizers to be followed.

dmp

this was probably the IBCA contest in NM or some such place, that involved Slap Your Daddy. They did not have the requisit number of teams, 25, and they so notified the competitors, some of which may have ignored the information and listed it anyway.