2016 tournament levels and the Dutch Juggling Championships results - Jan 6, 2016

In 2016 there are new guidelines in place to determine the points level of each tournament. The different requirements for each level will hopefully let organizers understand what kind of things they need to have in place for the size of their tournament. And any tournament that falls too far short of its announced points level will be worth fewer points to all the players.

On the other hand, a tournament that exceeds enough requirements for its points level may be worth more points than advertised!

That is what happened with the Dutch Juggling Championships 2016 this past weekend. It was listed as a 250 level tournament, which is the standard for a new small convention Fight Night. However, it attracted enough top 25 players to reach a participation level of 1.92, 18 players took part, all matches were played to two sets of three points (to three sets in the final), it all took place at a national event, was promoted in advance, and the whole thing was live streamed on YouTube... all of these combined to push it up to the 300 points level quite easily.

Eight jugglers took part in the knockout, and all except one of the round of 8 matches went according to the seeding. Sixth seed Julius Preu beat Simon À Campo to advance to the semi-finals, where he met Jan Poolen. Julius and Jan met in the Laer 2015 final in October, where Jan took the title. But on Friday night, Julius got his revenge, winning 3-2 3-0 to make it to the final.

On the other side of the draw, former top 2 player Iver Tronstad had little trouble making it to the final, dropping only a single point in his first two matches. Julius put up more resistance in the final, but Iver still won comfortably, without dropping a set. This now means Julius is the current holder of the "Always the Bridesmaid" title: he has been the runner up in four tournaments since September... and yet he has never won a tournament.

Iver gets 300 points, which puts him in first place in the 2016 race rankings and lifts him back into the top 10 of the current 52 week rankings. Julius's 180 second place points also lifts him to 10th in the current rankings, his first time inside the top 10. Jan Poolen earned himself 125 points for beating Leo Ostenrath in the third place match.

All the results and details can be found on the Dutch Juggling Championships 2016 pages here: http://fightnightcombat.com/tournament-Dutch-Juggling-Championships-2016.html

The tournament level guide for 2016 can be found here: http://fightnightcombat.com/level-guide.html