HOW THE SA SHOWJUMPING CHAMPIONSHIPS ACTUALLY WORK

The Toyota SA Senior Showjumping Championships are held at Kyalami Park Club this week. Here we explain how the competition works.

The Toyota SA Senior Showjumping Championships run at KPC from 5 to 9 August, and the biggest thing to understand is that the championship is not a single class, but rather a three-part system. Two qualifying classes feed a points table, the best combinations from that table go through to a final, and the final is decided over two rounds on aggregate faults.

Here is how each stage works, and why the best performing combination in the field deliberately jumps last.

Getting in: the two qualifiers

Every SA Championship title is preceded by two qualifying classes, and both count. At senior level the headline is the 1.50m Championship, and its two qualifiers are run at 1.50m.

Qualifier one is run under FEI Article 220.2.1.2, a class against the clock with a jump-off for those tied on faults for the lead. Qualifier two is run under FEI Article 220.2.1.1, a single round against the clock with no jump-off. A combination must complete at least one of the two qualifiers to be eligible for the Championship.

NOTE: A Championship is only classified as official, with trophies and medals awarded, if there are at least ten starters in each qualifier. Below that, SASJ can be asked to waive the rule, but the default is that ten starters per qualifier is the bar.

Making the cut

The two qualifiers rank combinations on a points scale, and the top 30 ranked combinations across the qualifiers go through to the Championship final.

The scale is deliberately top heavy. A win in a qualifier scores 50 points. Second scores 47. Third scores 45. Fourth scores 44, and from there it reduces by one point per place. This means that the gap between winning a qualifier and finishing second is three points, while the gap between, say, tenth and eleventh is a single point. Winning a qualifier is thus disproportionately valuable, and a rider who wins one of the two is in a very strong position going into the final.

As an added element, a rider may not ride more than two horses in the Championship class. If a rider qualifies three or more, they must nominate which two they will ride once the final qualifier list is known.

The final

The Championship class itself is run over two rounds under FEI Article 221, and for the adult title the second round is the identical course to the first, not a shortened one. The dimensions of the fences may be raised at the course designer’s discretion for that second round.

The first round course carries between ten and twelve numbered obstacles and must include either one double and one treble combination, or three double combinations. A water jump can feature, but only if water was also used in one of the qualifiers. Both rounds run back to back, with no more than fifteen minutes between them.

The winner is the combination with the fewest aggregate faults across both rounds, with the time in the second round used to separate them. If two or more combinations are tied on faults for first place after both rounds, there is a jump-off to decide the title. Everyone else is placed on their combined faults over the two rounds and their second round time. Crucially, the points from the qualifiers do not carry into this score; they simply decide who qualifies and the jumping order.

Why the best performing combination jumps last

The running order in the final is set in reverse order of merit. The combination that earned the fewest qualifying points jumps first, and the combination that topped the qualifiers jumps last. This is why the tension in a Championship builds: the strongest combinations on paper are still to come as the class goes on, and the leader on the day is often not confirmed until the final few rounds.

One practical change to this is that where a rider has two qualified horses, the organisers aim to leave a gap of at least ten horses between that rider’s two rounds, moving the lower qualified horse earlier so the rider is not jumping back to back.

The rest of the week

The senior 1.50m title is the headline, but it sits inside a much fuller programme, and two features are worth knowing.

The heights.There are Championship titles at 1.40m, 1.35m and 1.30m as well, each with its own qualifiers. A combination that does not make the top 30 for the 1.50m championship can still contest the 1.40m Championship, provided he has not already competed in a lower height championship class that would place him elsewhere. In short, missing the cut at the top does not end a combination’s week.

The interprovincial team event.Running alongside the individual Championships is the SA Senior Interprovincial Team event at 1.35m, contested by provincial teams. To ride for a province, a combination must also have entered the individual SA Championship. Teams are made up of a maximum of five nominated athletes and six horses, fielding four combinations in the competition with reserves. As with the individual title, there is an official threshold: at least three teams must start, or the competition is run but not classified as official, and no team medals are awarded.

The team class is itself a two-round competition, scored on the three best combination scores from each round, so a team can afford one weaker round from its fourth rider without it counting.

How to follow it this week

The competition runs from 5 to 9 August, across three arenas. The senior qualifiers are staged on separate days ahead of the Championship final, in line with the rule that no more than one qualifier per title runs on any given day. All of the Peter Minnie action will be streamed on EquiLive.

Sources: 2026 Toyota SA Senior Showjumping Championships schedule (KPC); SASJ Section 1, SA Championships Rules (25 Nov 2025); SASJ Section 6, National Team Events (25 Nov 2025); FEI Jumping Rules, 28th edition, effective 1 January 2026.