The American Quarter Horse Journal, April 24, 2008 – The American Quarter Horse Association has good news for members trying to qualify for the Bayer Select, Bank of America Amateur or FedEx Open World Championship Shows. During its April meeting, the AQHA Executive Committee approved lowering the qualifying points for those three premier events. With these lowered qualifying points, there’s still plenty of time for World Show hopefuls to qualify. For some, fewer points might mean fewer hours spent on the road during the show season and fewer stops at expensive fuel pumps, something every horse exhibitor can appreciate.

“In these days of increased prices for nearly everything, we want to serve our members in the best ways possible,” said Ken Mumy, AQHA President. “With today’s rising fuel costs, exhibitors are feeling the pinch, and by lowering the points, our hope is that members will be able to qualify more economically. We always look forward to seeing the best competitors at the World Show and want to help people who are World Show bound.”

Building on the excitement and improvements of last year’s Bayer Select, Bank of America Amateur and FedEx Open World Championship Shows, qualifiers are already up compared to 2007. In amateur competition, World Show qualifiers are up 143 from 604 in 2007 through March to 747 this year compared to the same period. There are 184 more qualifiers for the 2008 FedEx Open World Show compared to the same period in 2007. Last year, there were 639 qualifiers compared to 823 this year.

The majority of the increase in qualifiers can be attributed to the popularity of AQHA’s two newest classes, ranch sorting and performance halter. Points will not be reduced for these classes because this is the first full year exhibitors have been able to qualify for these events.

Following is the formula the executive committee used for point reductions.

Current Points:  Lower By:

2-2.5                            N/A

3-5.5                            1

6-10.5                          1.5

11-15.5                        2

16-20.5                        2.5

21-25.5                        3

26-up                           3.5

These qualifying point reductions will apply to the majority of Bank of America Amateur, FedEx Open and Bayer Select World Show classes. For a full list of the new 2008 Bank of America Amateur, FedEx Open and Bayer Select World Show qualifying points visit http://www.aqha.com/showing/shows/aqhapoints.html or

http://www.aqha.com/showing/shows/selectpoints.html.

The sixth installment of the Bayer Select World Championship Show takes place August 25-31 in Amarillo, Texas. For more on the Bayer Select, visit www.aqha.com/showing/shows/selectshow/index.html.  The 35th edition of the Bank of America Amateur and FedEx Open World Championship Shows take place November 8-22 at the newly remodeled State Fair Park in Oklahoma City. For more on those shows, visit www.aqha.com/showing/shows/worldshow/index.html. The Ford AQHYA World Championship Show makes its Oklahoma City debut August 1-9. Visit http://www.aqha.com/youth/activities/yws/index.html for details on the Ford Youth World Show.

AQHA news and information is a service of AQHA publications. For more information on The American Quarter Horse Journal, The American Quarter Horse Racing Journal or America’s Horse, visit www.aqha.com/magazines.