Department updates in Main Dressage

Online consultations on the FEI Regulations for Equestrian Events at the Olympic and Paralympic Games Paris 2024 were conducted on 21 and 22 March.

Participants had the opportunity to discuss the Jumping, Dressage and Para Dressage Regulations in individual sessions as part of the wide-ranging Paris 2024 consultation process. The discussion on the Eventing Regulations will take place on 28 March.

The consultations are an opportunity for stakeholders to review and comment on the feedback that was received on the pre-competition and competition Regulations for each discipline.

This feedback was collected through an online questionnaire circulated to stakeholders on 7 December 2021, and the information was reviewed by Consultative Groups set up for each Olympic and Paralympic discipline.

The questionnaire was sent to athletes, officials and other Tokyo 2020 stakeholders, in addition to representatives of the International Jumping Riders Club (IJRC), the International Jumping Officials Club (IJOC), the Jumping Owner’s Club (JOC), the International Dressage Riders Club (IDRC), the International Dressage Trainers Club (IDTC), the International Dressage Officials Club (IDOC), the International Eventing Officials Club (IEOC), FEI Regional Group Chairs, and the relevant FEI Technical Committees.

The information from the consultation sessions will now be consolidated and discussed by the relevant FEI Technical Committees before being put forward to the FEI Sports Forum for discussion on 25 April. The documents for discussion at the FEI Sports Forum, which will include the proposals of the Technical Committees, will be published in advance on the FEI Sports Forum Hub.

Key dates in the consultation process are as follows:

7 December 2021
Online questionnaire circulated to 302 Athletes; 51 National Federations; 35 Officials; 7 MOUs Stakeholders and 3 Discipline Managers. All of these stakeholders participated directly at Tokyo 2020 Olympic or Paralympic Games. The deadline for returning the questionnaire was 15 February 2022.

21 March 2022
Online Session - Paris 2024 Olympic Dressage Regulations
Online Session - Paris 2024 Paralympic Regulations

22 March 2022
Online Session - Paris 2024 Olympic Jumping Regulations

28 March
Online Session - Paris 2024 Olympic Eventing Regulations

25 April
FEI Sports Forum – Sessions dedicated to all the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Regulations.

July 2022
Revised Regulations to be sent to National Federations for further feedback.

October 2022
Proposed Olympic and Paralympic Regulations for Paris 2024 will be published, four weeks prior to the FEI General Assembly.

November 2022
NFs and other stakeholders will have one last opportunity to comment on the Regulations during the Rules Session, which will take place the day before the General Assembly.

The regulations will be put to a vote at the FEI General Assembly and the documents will be submitted to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) in 2023 for approval.

The guidelines, effective 1 January 2022, have been updated in March 2022, to reflect necessary changes in the quota allocation per NF, approved by the WBSFH and the FEI. The new Guidelines are available on Inside.FEI.org in the Dressage Rules section.

Taking into account the number of FEI Dressage World Cup™ legs, which were cancelled due to Covid-19 during the 2021/2022 season, the FEI Board accepted modifications to the qualification requirements to participate in the Final of the FEI Dressage World Cup™ 2022 and approved amendments to the Rules 2021/2022. The FEI Dressage World Cup™ 2021/2022 Rules have been updated. You will find the key modifications outlined below:  
Art. 1.9: The three best results (instead of four) obtained in the qualifying count in the Western European League (WEL), Central European League (CEL), and the Pacific League (PAL).
Art. 3.4: An athlete may only participate with one horse in the Final. He/she may select the horse of his/her choice, with the restriction that the horse must have started and qualified for at least one (instead of two) Grand Prix Freestyle to Music competition in the current season and have obtained the minimum qualification criteria of 68% in at least one (instead of two) the Grand Prix Freestyle at a CDI-W.
Art. 9.4.1. An athlete may start in the Final with one horse only. […] Having scored at least 68% in the Grand Prix Freestyle to Music in one FEI Dressage World Cup™ Qualifying event (CDI-W) (and no longer on two different occasions).
Art. 9.4.1.1 stating “For athletes not belonging to one of the recognised Leagues, one of the above results may be obtained at a CDI3*/CDI4/CDI5*/CDIO” has been deleted. Art. 9.5.2.3 5.2.3 If more starting places are available, these will be allocated to the athlete/horse combination(s) with the highest ranking (as a combination) on the February of the current year FEI Dressage World Ranking List, and who have participated in at least one (and no longer two) CDI-W.

The FEI has created a stakeholders survey to ensure the maintenance and continued improvement, of an already existing high standard, at FEI Events. This survey will help the FEI better understand the expectations of its key stakeholders, and the information collected will help guide the future approach of the FEI to ensuring that these are met.

The survey launches today and will be open until Monday 14 February 2022. We encourage everyone to take part in this survey, which should take no more than 10 minutes, and thank you in advance for your time.

Take the FEI Events Standards Stakeholder Survey - https://inside.fei.org/hub/fei-events-standards-stakeholders-survey

Taking into account the travel restriction still in place, mainly in Australia and New Zealand, the FEI Board approved the possibility for the Dressage Committee to grant exemptions on a case by case basis to review the requirements related to the appointment of Officials for competitions qualifying for the 2022 FEI Dressage World Championship and allow on-line supervision of competitions when and as appropriate. Judges Supervisory Panel (JSP) technical requirements Guidelines are available here.

During the season 2018-19, the extensive ECS report had been used for the Foreign Judge, Athletes and Grooms. It had been agreed not to use such a long report for the CDI-Ws, and to update and simplify all reports, to be published and implemented for 01.01.2022. The plan was to have the reports in digital form as well in the future.

Qualification criteria for all Championships 2023 have been approved by the Dressage Committee and are published here.

The FEI Board approved to de-freeze the FEI Dressage World Rankings from 1 August 2021, by four months at a time, which would allow the FEI Dressage World Rankings to be back to its normal 12-month rolling format in December 2021 (for 01.01.2022).

The FEI Dressage Committee has approved a modification to the Degree of Difficulty for Grand Prix Freestyle competitions. The modifiers for the DoD will be adjusted so that a combination needs to obtain at least 8.5 (instead of 10) for every element in order to receive a 10 for Degree of Difficulty. This change to the Degree of Difficulty system will come into force as of 01 July 2021 for all Events, when relevant, including the Tokyo Olympic Games.

The FEI Board approved a Covid-19 related resolution to waive the qualification criteria for the 2021 Youth Championships (Children, Juniors, Young Riders, U25 and Ponies) due to the limited opportunities for Athletes to achieve MERs, as a result of the restrictions on travel and cancellations of international events.

The same process will apply as for 2020, when the qualification criteria for the Youth Championships were also waived and NFs were responsible for selecting their best Athletes.