It seems like those with PR are playing qualis at 25K, but using at higher ranked events.Not sure if it is an ITF rule or just a tactic for collecting points.
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I can't see anything in the ITF rules about any tournaments where they can't use it. Probably more for match practice. And it's a Special Ranking for women, according to the ITF rulebook.
She has been out a long time. She probably wants to work her way back to match fitness and match confidence through qualifying tournaments. That way she gets more matches and more chance of building up to the harder matches later.
You get 12 if you havent competed for a full year...Maia?
Maia is using a SR she had from before she had long covid from being out between Sept 2019 and August 2020. That would have been frozen when she got long covid and it was 13 months before she next played in competition. She has 8 from that original spell out and I'm not sure whether she gets the extra 4 for being out of competition for more than a year on a frozen SR, but any that she used before she got covid will count towards her 8 or 12.
Katy will only have 8 as although she didn't play ITFs for more than a year her time out was in 2 spells, each of less than a year. She broke her out of competition period before she was out for 12 months by playing in the UKPL in Sept 2021.