Barefoot744
Bogey Member
Tournament registration is becoming increasingly correlated with internet speeds these days. This has persuaded many TDs to offer early entry sponsorship opportunities and Divisional Caps. These methods are new to me, so I have started looking into the Competition Manual to see which registration exceptions exist and how they can be applied.
Little background: I am not looking into any of this to try and call out any one or argue that these exceptions are not valid or warranted. Cheers to the TDs that are filling their tournaments in under 2 minutes! I'm sure this alleviates a ton of stress. Cheers to them for raising a bunch of sponsorship money for the course, the club, or the applicable prize purses! Courses, Clubs, and Purses will always benefit from more funds. Cheers to them for trying to grow under represented divisions! This is all great for them; having the funds upfront to cover the costs and know exactly what you can and cant do is fantastic. Ultimately, Cheers to the TD's for everything they do!!!
I just don't know much about these rules and would like to understand better.
Let us just consider A, B, and C Tiers held non-concurrently with any Majors or Elite Series.
1.02 Tournament Registration summarized
All openings in the field of play will be filled on a first-come, first served basis (Pro/Am)
Exceptions:
Unlimited Exceptions (can apply to 100% of the field)
Early Registration based on PDGA Player Rating (Rating Based Tiered Registration)
Early Registration based on qualification (Event or Points Based Qualification)
Early Registration based on divisions (Female, Junior, and/or 50+ Divisions)
Limited Exceptions (can apply to only a portion of the field, Pro and Am are separate)
(Only 33% of the entire Pro or Am field can be Class Capped)
(Only 50% of a division maybe be allocated to any combination of Exemptions)
Early Registration for hosting Club Members
Early Registration for Event Sponsors or the Sponsor's designated player
Early Registration for Volunteers
SO...
Seems like the Unlimited Exemptions by themselves are pretty straight forward.
The Limited Exceptions are a little more difficult:
If a TD may allow early registration to 33% of an entire field for Club Members, Sponsors, and Volunteers but only 50% of any one Division... uffda that seems like it could get messy once multiple exceptions are used. It seems as if a TD would have to Cap all divisions that would be allowed any early registrations so they knew if they reached the 50% allowable. This seems hard as these players would probably come from a large number of divisions which would ultimately cause problems with the 33% of the field capped restriction... I see the point but 102.C.3.c seems problematic in execution.
Now, can a TD use both Limited and Unlimited Exceptions? I do not see anywhere that states that a TD couldn't, it seems like it is more implying that one could.
Example 1:
1. Open Early Registration for Sponsors (33% of the potential field, No Divisional Caps)
2. Tier the remaining spots by PDGA Player Rating
Example 2:
1. Cap 25% of the potential field by Divisions; say all Female, Junior, and/or 50+ Divisions.
2. Open Early Registration for all Capped Divisions since these chosen divisions all fall under the Unlimited Exception.
3. Also Open Early Registration within Non-Capped Divisions for Sponsors/Clubs/Volunteers, not to exceed 8% of the total. (25% Caps + 8% Sponsors = 33%). This could get messy if the Capped Divisions don't fill then these SCV spots could be more.
4. Tier the remaining spots by PDGA Player Rating
I suppose Example 2 could get away from a lot of the mess without Caps and still provide for the normally under represented divisions:
1. Open Early Registration for all divisions that fall under the Unlimited Exception (Female, Junior, and/or 50+).
2. Open Early Registration in all other Divisions for Sponsors/Clubs/Volunteers not to exceed 33% of the entire potential field.
3. Tier the remaining spots by PDGA Player Rating
Well you made it this far, congratulations or i'm sorry.
The reason I am looking further into these rules is because of the Wisconsin Tour, a selected group of generally unaffiliated PDGA events that are used to determine the "Wisco Tour Champions". The Tour is heavily followed (2000+ individuals played at least one event in 2020) and can greatly boost tournament's popularity as some players try to accumulate points for the Championship. The Tour does not dictate how any one event is run by the TD, they are all separate. This is resulting in very high demand and extremely short registration windows. Even early sponsorship ($100+) registrations are filling in less than 5 minutes. Like stated above, this is fantastic for the TDs. However, I feel it may be devaluing the Tour as the best players are not getting into events regularly.
For example; the latest tournament provided 18 spots for MPO. The Tour last year saw 300 different MPO players. This past registration only 4 of the past year's top 20 finishers were able to get in. The waiting list has 8 or more of the top 20, just to show that it is not a lack of interest that is keeping them out.
I am just trying to look into options to keep both the TDs happy, the players happy, and hold the Tour's value while staying within the PDGA's rules. Just ideas to maybe formulate some options in the future, if the community so desires.
Little background: I am not looking into any of this to try and call out any one or argue that these exceptions are not valid or warranted. Cheers to the TDs that are filling their tournaments in under 2 minutes! I'm sure this alleviates a ton of stress. Cheers to them for raising a bunch of sponsorship money for the course, the club, or the applicable prize purses! Courses, Clubs, and Purses will always benefit from more funds. Cheers to them for trying to grow under represented divisions! This is all great for them; having the funds upfront to cover the costs and know exactly what you can and cant do is fantastic. Ultimately, Cheers to the TD's for everything they do!!!
I just don't know much about these rules and would like to understand better.
Let us just consider A, B, and C Tiers held non-concurrently with any Majors or Elite Series.
1.02 Tournament Registration summarized
All openings in the field of play will be filled on a first-come, first served basis (Pro/Am)
Exceptions:
Unlimited Exceptions (can apply to 100% of the field)
Early Registration based on PDGA Player Rating (Rating Based Tiered Registration)
Early Registration based on qualification (Event or Points Based Qualification)
Early Registration based on divisions (Female, Junior, and/or 50+ Divisions)
Limited Exceptions (can apply to only a portion of the field, Pro and Am are separate)
(Only 33% of the entire Pro or Am field can be Class Capped)
(Only 50% of a division maybe be allocated to any combination of Exemptions)
Early Registration for hosting Club Members
Early Registration for Event Sponsors or the Sponsor's designated player
Early Registration for Volunteers
SO...
Seems like the Unlimited Exemptions by themselves are pretty straight forward.
The Limited Exceptions are a little more difficult:
If a TD may allow early registration to 33% of an entire field for Club Members, Sponsors, and Volunteers but only 50% of any one Division... uffda that seems like it could get messy once multiple exceptions are used. It seems as if a TD would have to Cap all divisions that would be allowed any early registrations so they knew if they reached the 50% allowable. This seems hard as these players would probably come from a large number of divisions which would ultimately cause problems with the 33% of the field capped restriction... I see the point but 102.C.3.c seems problematic in execution.
Now, can a TD use both Limited and Unlimited Exceptions? I do not see anywhere that states that a TD couldn't, it seems like it is more implying that one could.
Example 1:
1. Open Early Registration for Sponsors (33% of the potential field, No Divisional Caps)
2. Tier the remaining spots by PDGA Player Rating
Example 2:
1. Cap 25% of the potential field by Divisions; say all Female, Junior, and/or 50+ Divisions.
2. Open Early Registration for all Capped Divisions since these chosen divisions all fall under the Unlimited Exception.
3. Also Open Early Registration within Non-Capped Divisions for Sponsors/Clubs/Volunteers, not to exceed 8% of the total. (25% Caps + 8% Sponsors = 33%). This could get messy if the Capped Divisions don't fill then these SCV spots could be more.
4. Tier the remaining spots by PDGA Player Rating
I suppose Example 2 could get away from a lot of the mess without Caps and still provide for the normally under represented divisions:
1. Open Early Registration for all divisions that fall under the Unlimited Exception (Female, Junior, and/or 50+).
2. Open Early Registration in all other Divisions for Sponsors/Clubs/Volunteers not to exceed 33% of the entire potential field.
3. Tier the remaining spots by PDGA Player Rating
Well you made it this far, congratulations or i'm sorry.
The reason I am looking further into these rules is because of the Wisconsin Tour, a selected group of generally unaffiliated PDGA events that are used to determine the "Wisco Tour Champions". The Tour is heavily followed (2000+ individuals played at least one event in 2020) and can greatly boost tournament's popularity as some players try to accumulate points for the Championship. The Tour does not dictate how any one event is run by the TD, they are all separate. This is resulting in very high demand and extremely short registration windows. Even early sponsorship ($100+) registrations are filling in less than 5 minutes. Like stated above, this is fantastic for the TDs. However, I feel it may be devaluing the Tour as the best players are not getting into events regularly.
For example; the latest tournament provided 18 spots for MPO. The Tour last year saw 300 different MPO players. This past registration only 4 of the past year's top 20 finishers were able to get in. The waiting list has 8 or more of the top 20, just to show that it is not a lack of interest that is keeping them out.
I am just trying to look into options to keep both the TDs happy, the players happy, and hold the Tour's value while staying within the PDGA's rules. Just ideas to maybe formulate some options in the future, if the community so desires.
