Dear Colleagues,

We would like to invite you and your team to the 48th Winston Churchill Classic hosted in-person on January 6-8, 2023.

We are proud to have been awarded TOC bids from the University of Kentucky in LD (semifinals), Gold PF (finals), Silver PF (semifinals), Congress (top 6) and all relevant Speech events. We are also pleased to announce that we are also a NIETOC qualifying tournament in the relevant speech events as well as a TFA qualifying tournament.

In debate events we will feature 6 preliminary debate rounds for VLD and VPF, and 5 preliminary rounds for VCX and WSD. All Novice events will have 4 rounds and clear to an appropriate number of elims. If numbers are large enough, we will expand VCX to 6 preliminary rounds as well.

Debates will begin Friday afternoon with semifinal and final debates on Sunday for VLD and VPF. While we recognize that this is a significant departure than the schedule of years past, as the tournament grows in both size and bid levels, it is necessary for us to create a more humane schedule for coaches, students, and judges alike.

Congressional debate will feature one prelim with semifinal and final rounds to follow.

Speech events will feature two preliminary rounds, and quarters, semis, and finals based on entry numbers.

While we anticipate a larger field in all events, we still are determined to provide a quality tournament experience for all competitors and to maintain a fair break in all speech and debate events while also keeping the schedule as humane as possible. In order to accomplish this, it is necessary for us to implement event caps in our events.

For all Varsity Debate events, we will place an initial entry cap at 72 entries with an overall event cap of 96 entries. We will give priority for the waitlisted spots to schools from Central/South Texas before opening the waitlist up to all schools. If the initial cap is reached, we will admit entries off of the waitlist until December 14, after that date, all waitlist restrictions will be lifted.

In all Speech events, we will have an initial entry cap of 72 entries and an overall event cap of 96 entries. Waitlist priority will be given to schools from Central/South Texas until December 14 at which point all waitlist restrictions will be lifted until our overall cap is reached.

In Congress we will have an initial cap of 80 entries.

We look forward to hosting you in January. The full invitation and tournament information can be found on the right, if you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out.

Sincerely,

Preston Stolte, Daniel Moore, Ian Dill, and Kandi King