Dear Ring Sport enthusiasts:
In order to help promote the growth and development of French Ring in North America, we have formed a new Ringsport association called the American Ringsport Federation / Alliance Ring Français – or ARF. ARF will be run under the auspices of the American Canine Association (ACA) in the United States and we have requested and are receiving assistance from the CUN, and the GTR in France. We will use, and adhere to the Rules for French Ringsport Trials and the Decoy Guidebook officially translated into English in France, without any modifications or omissions. It is our hope that we can work in an atmosphere of friendly competition and cooperation with all the other Ring associations in North America in order to generate more interest in the sport to the benefit of all of our organizations.
Our philosophy and approach is that people can belong to and compete with more than one organization. The CUN has asked that all of the Associations that participate in Ring respect and recognize each other. In accordance with this request, we will accept valid scorebooks and decoy books, from any organization that operates under the SCC rules of French Ring. We have concentrated our efforts in Growing Ring in the Eastern United States. It is our feeling that one of the main issues that has prevented the growth of Ring in the United States has been the sheer size of the country. Geographical issues and logistics have made it difficult to reach any sort of “saturation point.” We believe that focusing on a single region will help promote interest in the sport and help it grow.
Our trial season and format will mimic that of France. Our championship will be in June or July, and our selectifs will be in May. The remainder of the trial season will be for club trials and pre-selectifs. We will be having a “Coupe of Champions” in July in conjunction with our Championship. This will be an annual invitational event and we will to invite all North American champions to participate. We will also extend invitations to champions of other countries which practice Ringsport. We believe this will be a great weekend of Ringsport where the best dogs from all corners of North America will be able to compete head to head to declare the Champion of Ring for the U.S.
Again, we would like to reiterate that the goals of ARF are to help grow and bring credibility to French Ring in the United States, and, in conjunction with the ACA, to help improve the breeds that compete in this sport which we all love. We hope to be a complement to the other Ring associations in North America and we look forward to friendly competition on the trial field.