April 4/08 10:17 am - National Carding Goes to Dispute Resolution

Posted by Editor on 04/4/08
 

National Carding Goes to Dispute Resolution

Carding for the national team is always messy business, with many more deserving recipients than there are Cards available. Each sports body is given a limited number of Cards, and has to determine which athletes should receive them, based on both federal funding rules and the Associations on criteria.

It is fairly natural that, at times, there will be disputes as to whether an Association made the proper choice in handing out Cards, and athletes have the option of disputing the allocation of carding funds.

This has happened recently in cycling, with Dominique Perras arguing that an alleged discrepancy in the wording of the French versus English versions of the criteria document affected his ability to receive funding. His argument potentially affected the funding which went to two other riders - Andrew Randell and Andrew Pinfold - who were directly involved in the dispute, as well as the Canadian Cycling Association.

The case went to arbitration, with arbitrator Michel G. Picher holding a hearing and ruling against Perras based on the Canadian Sport Dispute Resolution Code.

The full decision can be found Here but, briefly, the situation boiled down to the following:

In the English version of the Automatic Senior Card Criteria, it includes the following qualifying standard:

Two times: top-8 in UCI Continental Tour events or top-16 in UCI ProTour events (not including ITT or criterium stages/events)

In the French version this same criteria is written as:

À deux reprises : classement dans les 8 premiers à une épreuve du Tour continental UCI, ou dans les 16 premiers à une épreuve du Pro Tour UCI (excluant les étapes et épreuves de contre-la-montre individuel ou de critérium)

20 riders met this criteria (including Perras, Randell and Pinfold), so the CCA went to the further standard of ranking who was highest, and Perras was denied funding.

Perras' argument was that according to the French criteria as written, individual stage results in a stage race cannot be counted, only the GC.. The CCA's argument was that it was only specific types of stages that are excluded, such as criteriums and time trials. The CCA says that this is what they intended, and that this is how it has always been interpreted.

The arbitrator agreed with the CCA interpretation, and dismissed Dominique Perras' appeal of the cardings which were awarded.