I have not been a member of the IWPA for very long, nor have I been weight pulling for all that long, so take these meandering thoughts of mine with a large grain of salt :-) I think that you brought up some good points but the way I see it, the point system, however imperfect that it is, seems to be the best system at this time. I have problems with it as well. I think that it is unfair for a dog to medal in two different weight classes thus taking away another dog’s ability to compete at the pull-off. Also the fact that there are people who only show up for two pulls, qualify, and do not support the IWPA whatsoever kind of gets my goat as well (Notwithstanding those that have no in-region pulls available to them.). But what system could we use? Take the top three dogs that pulled the highest amount of weight during the season or the highest averages? Than you would have people complaining about conditions and equipment - i.e. carpeted surfaces allow higher percentages than a dirt surfaces or the snow was mush at one snow pull and the snow was perfect at the other. Someone once mentioned to me that maybe we should allow individuals to compete at the pull-off if that have not medaled and just have them pay more than the medaling competitors. Is this feasible? Don’t know, I have only been to one pull-off and do not know the impact of such a rule would have on the championship. There is also the idea of regional realignment. Regional realignment is a difficult issue, in my opinion, since the dogs pulling in a region change from year to year as do where the pullers and organizers live. Perhaps the IWPA should either only allow you to pull in-region or allow you to count as many out-of-region pulls as you want. Either way, you still have the point system but perhaps one of those options would solve some of the problems. I do not know because I have not been around as long as you and many others.
        Here is my perspective though. As it stands right now, it is at least 3 to 6 hours less driving time for me to go out-of-region than it is to go to some of the pulls in my region. Is the competition in my weight class easier in the other region? In my opinion - yes. But I think that it is unfair to penalize my dogs and I for choosing to drive 3 hours to go to an out-of-region pull versus 9 hours to go to an in-region pull. Do not get me wrong, I am not trying to promote allowing more out-of-region pulls here, just that I have seen people frown upon going out-of-region when there is an in-region pull available (even though it is 3 times the distance of the out-of-region pull). Will I occasionally drive to those 9 hour in-region pull? Yes, if there is not a closer pull (and I can afford it time and money wise), I will go because I think that is unrealistic for me not to go against some of the best dogs in the nation in my weight class. I competed in 14 wheel pulls this season (4 out-of-region and 10 in-region) and 6 snow pulls (4 out-of-region and 2 in-region) - did I go to all of these pulls just for the points? No, (Of course the points that counted I am not complaining about.) I went to many of these pulls to get my dogs (who are in their first year of weight pulling) pulling against different dogs on different surfaces. I want to be competitive someday in this sport but the only way my dogs can gain experience is by going to different pulls, whether they be in-region or out-of-region. Whew! I have been thinking out loud here :-) Needless to say, this is just my opinion. I feel as if I have not answered your question and I doubt I could if I tried but I just cannot think of another system that would work. Do you have any other systems in mind? I would love to hear about them if so.

Dean again thanks for the reply. I think that you are getting your points across just fine and you have a lot of good points and although I do not agree with some of them we both certainly have a right to have and to express our opinions.

I was generalizing about the whispering and I did not mean to accuse you of doing this now. I'm sure you talked to Chris before you brought this up.

I disagree that there should be an unlimited number of dogs invited to the Championships. There just isn't enough time to do that unless only two classes were pulled per day. As I said before I think that the top three dogs who finish the season pulling in a particular class should be the ones invited.

As far as the "Point Chasing" that I did. This is the way the system is and you really gave me no choice. Was I really just supposed to bend over and take my medicine? I would not have gone to WA if there were three slots available in my class. If you look at Chicago you will see that both days were very competitive at the top level. If you look further you will see that I was in fact beaten by the other Swissy on Sunday. I guess that was what I wanted to arrange since the only reason any other Swissys are pulling is because I paid them to. As far as WA is concerned I agree that it looks bad. There is no way I can convince you to believe anything else than what you already do so I won't try. But quite frankly, so what if I did know that there would be a bunch of dogs in my class. If I did know and didn't go, that would make me an idiot. Why in the hell would I give up a chance to compete at the Championships? Do you think quitting is "sportsmanlike"? The rules were set up so that provisional dogs could contribute points. That must be what the people who wrote the rules wanted. They must have seen the logic of creating a system that allowed for some excitement at the end of the Season. They must have understood that it's not in the best interest of any sport to have the same people win all of the time. I can certainly live with my decision and in fact would do exactly the same thing again if the situation were the same.

If you would like to address the Provisional issue directly, I would be willing to join you in submitting a proposal to the board to the effect that provisional dogs could not contribute points. I feel that along with this we would need to allow new members to join at a reduced rate in the middle or at the end of a season.

As far as the level of competition that we each faced there is no effective difference. You knew full well that none of the region 9 dogs or the region 3 dog that comes down, in the 120's could beat your dogs. Except for Boogie none of us ever had a chance to beat either of your dogs all season. Even Boogie although he has the strength to beat your dogs, doesn't have the attitude to realistically compete with you on a regular basis. So what's the difference between you going to a local pull knowing that you were going to win and me or Chris going to an out of region pull and knowing that we had a good chance to beat most of the dogs. In fact if you look at all of the dogs I faced this year I went up against the number one and two dogs in two regions (9,2) and the top three dogs in another region (4) while you stayed at home and only faced one dog, that you didn't own, who was close to your level. In addition if look closely at the weights you will see that several of the dogs that I faced in WA and Chris faced in MT were one or two increments below us. Which is exactly the same spread that you have over the dogs below you in this region

Please don't make any assumptions as to why I didn't pull Luc in March last year after he had totally healed from his injury. Terry will be happy to tell you that we told him last year at the amateur pull before the plantation pulls (where Luc pulled just under 3000#, all the weight that was there) that we did not want to prevent another dog from going to the Championships. He thought we were nuts but that's the way it was.

This is the hard part for me to understand. If you knew that Chris was going and he told you there would be a bunch of dogs then why did you chose to forfeit the gold? You knew the rules. If the playoffs are an away game you still have to go in order to win the game. If you choose not to play you only can blame yourself if someone else gets the title. Chris did the honorable thing by telling you. Perhaps he wanted you to have the chance to claim what he felt was rightfully yours.

Feel free to continue with this specific issue if you want to but if you are game I think that instead of talking about specific events this is a good place to broaden our discussion to the upcoming proposed changes in the IWPA. Do you have any thoughts as to the A, B proposal? I am adamantly opposed to dividing the IWPA into an elite group and an average or novice group. What do you think?