A Record Amount of Countries Represented in Dark Horses
The second sign-up for the Dark Horses Qualifications ended last week on Tuesday 15th of July. All chosen Dark Horses have now been contacted. This year the organizers were surprised by the amazing amount of applicants, most of which signed up during the second round. Some re-planning was required to make sure that as many willing Dark Horses as possible were able to get admitted to compete at the qualifications.
The amount of Dark Horses wasn’t however the only surprise, since there was also a record amount of countries represented within the applicants. The Qualifications happening in Oulu exactly in a month, on Thursday 21st of August will have contestants competing from 12 different countries – Taiwan, United Kingdom, New Zealand, Scotland, United States, France, Germany, Finland, Belgium, Japan, Sweden and Norway! In the very traditional way, most Dark Horses will arrive from France, Germany and United States with all having five contestants competing at the qualifications.
Once we count in Canada and Netherlands which both have National Champions at the final, it is possible that on the World Final stage we might even see contestants representing 14 different countries!