There are substantial prize money increases for the 2012 Winmau BDO British Classic to be played for the first time at Coventry’s impressive Ricoh Arena on Saturday, July 14th.

Total prize money is being increased by £3,780 to £10,280 with the Women’s Singles Champion seeing prize money doubling from £500 to £1,000, and all other women’s prizes showing 100% increases as follows:

2012 Champion: £1,000; runner-up £400; Semi-Finalists £160 each; Quarter-Finalists £80 each and Jt.9th £40 each.

The Men’s Singles retains its top prize of £3,000 but all other prize money increases as follows:

Runner-up: £1,200; Semi-Finalists £500 each; Q/f: £250 each and Jt 9th £125 each.

The Winmau BDO British Classic will be the BDO’s major event in a ‘Festival of Darts’ that sees a unique collaboration between the BDO and the England Darts Organisation (EDO) to produce an exciting long-weekend of darts from Friday, July 13th to Sunday, July 15th .

The mouth-watering line-up will combine two major events on the darts calendar – the WINMAU BDO BRITISH CLASSIC and the EDO ENGLAND MASTERS.

Both will feature Men’s and Women’s events carrying valuable ranking points.

In addition, there will be the inaugural Ricoh Arena Open Singles on Friday, July 13th with a guaranteed prize fund of £1,500. It is an exciting curtain-raiser for the weekend and open to players eligible to play in the Winmau World Masters and Lakeside World Professional Championships. The Champion will be invited to this year’s Winmau World Masters and the International Play-Offs for the 2013 Lakeside World Professional Darts Championships.

There is a bonus for the general public because entry to all events at the Ricoh Arena will be free!

Schedule of Events

Friday, July 13th Ricoh Arena Darts Open (Singles) at 8pm. Entry on the day. £1500 Guaranteed Prize Money. For players eligible to play in the Winmau World Masters and Lakeside World Professional.

Saturday, July 14th England National Men’s and Women’s Singles at 10am British Classic Men’s and Women’s Singles at 1pm

Grosvenor Grand Prix of Darts Men’s and Women’s Grand Finals at 7pm Sunday, July 15th England Masters Men’s and Women’s Singles at 11am

England Masters Youth at 1PM England Masters Men’s and Women’s Pairs at 3pm

The Ricoh Arena is situated in the centre of the country and easily accessible by road, rail and air. There are a multitude of hotels within minutes of the venue, adequate parking facilities and excellent catering facilities.

Both the Winmau BDO British Classic and EDO England Masters will be played exclusively on Winmau Blade 4 dartboards.

We are pleased to announce the return of the Lakeside Classic Tournament on Sunday the 8th July 2012 in the Canal Suite of the Lakeside Country Club.

£8600.00 minimum prize money will be on offer for the Mens and Ladies Tournaments.

E-mail idpapro@gmail.com for your entry form. Full details on entry form.

Please note we wish to confirm that BDO playing rules apply and all entries must be from players who play within BDO Eligibility rules. Because of the enormous number of complaints from players regarding other Organisations allowing ineligible players to play in their Tournaments this Eligibilty Rule will be strictly adhered to.

As in the past both new Champions will gain entry into the Winmau World Masters and Lakeside World Professional International play-offs.

For further information contact us on 01206 542904 or 07719 028888 or email us on idpapro@gmail.com. The IDPA can confirm that discussions with our Commercial partners has led to an offer for the IDPA to promote several of these Tournaments each year.

Everything is in place to bring these Tournaments to players of all abilities, However player apathy in the past has led to the loss of many Tournaments because of low entries. The Tournaments are on offer but players must play their part.

The Directors and Members of the IDPA send their sincere condolences to their CEO Martin Fitzmaurice and his family, on the sad passing of his beloved wife, Doreen, on Friday, 23 March 2012.

The sentiments of all are echoed in this moving tribute by Trina Gulliver:

“I am very sad to hear of the passing of Doreen Fitzmaurice. I have had the pleasure of her company many times whilst working with Martin.

A lovely lady who always had a great sense of humour. Her daughters all have her personality in that sense and I’m sure that this will help them all through this very difficult time.

She loved her grandchildren, which both her and Martin have told me and others, their funny antics and she always used to have a beaming smile when telling the stories. She was always very proud of them all.

Martin, I know will miss her immensely, however, he has a loving family and darts family around him to help him through.

Be strong love, you are loved very much.

God bless you Doreen. Have a drink with my Mum in Heaven. Angels together xxxx”.

With reference to the article on the BDO web site last week that referred to
the BDO Isle of Man Tournament we can confirm, as questioned, that this very
successful long standing Tournament is privately promoted by Les France, a
gentleman who was one of the original Directors of the BDO.
Therefore to those who brought this subject to our attention the statement that it
is a BDO Tournament is incorrect and it should have stated that it is a “BDO ranked
Tournament”

The IDPA today contacted the promoters of the 2012 Antwerp Open to seek confirmation of their Tournament scheduled for the 28/29 April 2012.

We can confirm that the Tournament will not take place on these dates.

Said Promoters have informed the IDPA that there is a possibility of the Tournament taking place later this year.

The IDPA will ensure that all members will be kept up to date on any developments.

The IDPA have spent the past 72 hours in attempting to put together a up to date position of the current BDO Invitational Ranking Table.

These are now being published on our Rankings page. Please note that these tables are
based on information given to us and could be subject to change.

The following has been received in a press release sent to the IDPA by Mariflex:

Dean Winstanley’s move to the PDC came as a complete surprise to his sponsor MariFlex.

Dean was included in the MariFlex Team in February 2011 after his successful debut at Lakeside and his England teammates are Tony O’Shea and Darryl Fitton. Together with the Dutch trio of Joey ten Berge, Willy van de Wiel and Jan Dekker they completed a balanced Anglo-Dutch team to represent Mariflex in all top competitions.

While MariFlex wishes Dean good luck in the future, his decision has lost him his place in the Mariflex team and a beneficial sponsor contract in the process.

MariFlex, main sponsor of the WDF-BDO and Zuiderduin Masters classified international MariFlex Open Darts tournament, wishes to declare that it will remain loyal to the WDF-BDO circuit and will therefore not support players outside the BDO and WDF.

As a result MariFlex has decided, with immediate effect, to sever all ties with Dean Winstanley.

On behalf of the IDPA Board of Directors we send sincere condolences to Trina Gulliver on the sad news that her dear mother, Muriel, passed away in the early hours of Thursday January 5th 2012.

Our thoughts are with Trina and her family at this very sad time.

In honour of a request from her mom, Trina will be competing in the 2012 Lakeside Women’s World Championships and on Sunday, January 8th she will begin her defence of the title she has won 9 times.

Please note that the first two days (four sessions) for the Lakeside World Championships are completely SOLD OUT.

The IDPA wish to place on record their sincere thanks to the new BDO Board in announcing the initial changes in the criteria of the BDO Invitation Ranking Table.
As our members will be well aware the IDPA have canvassed for several years for the  new changes  that have been announced and all credit to the new BDO Directors to our first request for consideration of the now approved changes now in place.

Therefore we can confirm that the changes agreed are:- Twelve sets of points to count instead of the current ten.The new Invitational table will be a constantly rolling table with the previous years points for tournaments only removed when the current year’s event has taken place. Please note that no event will count twice towards any qualification criteria.Cut off date for the 2013 Lakeside International Play offs will now be the 30th September 2012.

Members please note that the current problems with the latest publication of the BDO Invitational Ranking Tables have been caused by a technical fault with the Webmasters employed by the BDO.

We have been informed that the BDO are attempting to rectify the problems as soon as possible. We will keep you up to date on developments.

We are pleased to inform that there has been a alteration to the initial press release regarding the forthcoming World Masters. We have been informed by the new Board of Directors of the BDO that there will be no admission charge into the venue for players who have been knocked out of the Tournament on previous days.
These players must retain and wear their players wrist bands to gain entry. No wrist band, no entry, without paying.
We can also report that all Youth players are allowed one free ticket for their chaperone.

Since 1994 the IDPA have been responsible for the selection of referees for major  BDO Tournaments.
We can confirm that the IDPA will still be responsible to the new BDO Tournament Director Wayne Williams to supply the required personnel.
The Master Callers Panel was established in 1994 as a subsidiary of the IDPA and those wishing to be considered should initially contact Martin Fitzmaurice on idpamcp@gmail.com or 07719 028888.
All applicants are vetted and those chosen for the Panel are graded initially according to experience. There are four grades.

The IDPA thanks the BDO for the increase in the number of logos on players playing shirts being raised to 3 for the forthcoming Winmau World Masters in Hull.
Please note that the John Smiths Logo must be worn on the breast pocket of the players shirt.

On behalf of the IDPA we wish to extend our sincere congratulations to the newly elected Board of Directors of the BDO.
The fact that the Counties have voted our Chairman Martin Adams to become Players Director is a radical move and much appreciated by players of all abilities.
The IDPA looks forward to cementing a first class professional working relationship with the new Board and other spheres of our system to ensure that the BDO moves forward in all aspects of our sport.
The platform has now been set for co-operation between all levels of the BDO so that the decline in many areas of our sport quickly disappears and is replaced by a vibrant new system for all.

In response to questions posed this morning by members we can confirm that we have been informed that at least five people have been nominated for election to the BDO Board of Directors.
The IDPA has also been informed that confirmation of this situation is to be e-mailed to Counties later today.

The IDPA are please to announce that our Director Sylvia Smart has been chosen to act as Players Marshall at future major Tournaments commencing with the forthcoming Winmau World Masters in Hull.
Player members of the IDPA were consulted and were unanimous in endorsing the choice.
We wish Sylvia all the best.

The IDPA find it most strange that there is a lack of acknowledging success by some Affiliated web sites on their own members.
Surely winning a major Tournament should be celebrated by, at least, a posting on web sites where the player is based. 

When the IDPA was established in 1994 a few  BDO County officials actually asked our Chief Executive  about the meaning of our mission statement  “You cannot play darts without dart players”

It now appears that at a recent meeting it was stated that although our mission statement was now understood, it was also stated that   “you cannot play darts without officials”

Whilst the IDPA are in full agreement with this statement, the system that we play in has to be correct in all matters and officials must respect the players who travel the world promoting our sport.

Similarly, the players need to respect the officials and both players and officials have to earn this respect

However, how are players expected to react when the most capped player and longest serving captain of his country. Three times a Lakeside World Champion, three times a World Master and twice World Cup Singles Champion is described by an official as  “only a player”.

To clarify it was not a BDO official who made the statement.

In response to the comment made last week at Brean Sands asking what do English players “get out of it”.  The WDF ranking system.

We can confirm that no less than ten English players picked up sums ranking from $2000.00 to $200.00 for an overall total of $9900.00 last year for top places in the WDF ranking system table.

Add to this a further $1300.00 won by Scottish and Welsh players making the overall British total $11200.00.

Not for the first time British players potential earnings are being attacked from within.