posted Aug 16th, 2012 - Like last year, the Norwegian Nationals 2012 were organized by the Tønsberg Fallskjermklubb which is located in Tønsberg, a city approximately one hour southwest of Oslo. It is the home dropzone of DeLand Norgies members Lise Nansen and Carl-Erik Tuv and the home of the one and only Norwegian Twin Otter.

The Tønsberg Fallskjermklubb is also one of the Polaris sponsors. Norway's national team in the female 4way category spent two weeks at the dropzone in July and made 83 jumps despite sometimes challenging weather conditions.

Four teams signed up for the 4way AAA/Open Class competition and six more teams for the A/Intermediate Class. First there was only one 8way team. Norgies Tail Carl-Erik Tuv then began to activate and recruit more lineups and had eventually three more teams for the 8way event. Polaris member Trude Sviggum said that the Norgies 8way lineup (Norgies + Sissel Finnseth, Espen Evensen, Ole Petter Hjelle and Nikolai Nansen) is the only real 8way team in Norway at the moment. The team spent a week in DeLand this winter training with player coach Kirk Verner in Carl-Erik Tuv's slot.

Trude Sviggum also said that one of the pickup 8way teams (Amok Living Legends) consisted of six freeflyers (42Freefly + Sweet Freefly) and only two bellyflyers (Yngve Haugom and Mario Caprino): "They had never done 8way before and did not have big expectations hoping to be able to make one point in working time. However, to their own and everybody else's surprise they rocked! They got very good coaching and help from Kjetil Nordin. At the closing banquet almost all the freeflyers in that team told me that doing 8way was the highlight of the meet..."

Kjetil Nordin confirmed that the team had great fun: "Originally they just wanted to do one round, and goof off, to fill up the number of teams, but I talked them into trying their best at least in one round. They scored a 4-pointer and ended up being in 2nd place. That was all they needed, and their motivation was sky high for the rest of the competition. They scored 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 3 and a 5-pointer in the final round. They were pretty proud of themselves."

Norwegian Nationals 2012		Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Round 6	Round 7	Total	Avg
Rank	A Class	O,J,19	Q,K,E	M,4	G,7	8,L	P,H,A	21,D	Total	Avg
1	KFP (NO)	15	21	12	14	13	24	11	110	15.7
2	Swingers (NO)	11	16	13	13	10	20	13	96	13.7
3	Golden Lockpins (NO)	12	15	11	12	10	18	8	86	12.3
4	Ellens Flyboys (NO)	8	11	8	5	5	14	4	55	7.9
5	Bifrost (NO)	7	9	8	8	3	12	7	54	7.7
6	Air4s (NO)	1	2	2	2	2	5	2	16	2.3

Trude Sviggum reported that the 4way A/Intermediate Class competition was as usual a competiton between Lise Nansen's team Swingers and Pål Kolbentvedt's team KFP: "This year, KFP opened hard and continued to lead all the way throught the meet. They even got a new national record when they scored 24 points in Round 6."

The previous highscore for a single round was 21 points, and KFP's 15.7 average in the A Class is also a new record average for the Norwegian A/Intermediate Class category.

The Golden Lockpins from the Hagl Fallskjermklubb have been training together for a couple of years now and were happy to win the bronze medals this year. Team member Yngve Haugom used to be a member of the former national team Nexus.

Norwegian Nationals 2012		Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Round 6	Round 7	Round 8	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	6,Q,14	12,19,H	22,L,F,8	20,5,10	D,1,A,11	21,N,13	P,O,C,17	E,M,K,9	Total	Avg
1	DeLand Norgies (NO)	19	18	17	15	20	18	27	38	172	21.5
2	Polaris (NO)	19	13	15	13	17	14	21	29	141	17.6
3	Ernie Bernie (NO)	9	7	7	9	7	6	11	14	70	8.8
4	Femme Fatale (NO)	6	6	8	7	8	8	9	13	65	8.1

Polaris at the Norwegian Nationals 2012

There were no surprises in the 4way AAA/Open Class competition. Polaris had a great start and tied the Norgies in Round 1. However, Trude Sviggum said that it was all Norgies from then on: "After that it was all about the Norgies. They even scored a new national record for a single round with the 38-pointer in Round 8. This was probably their best meet after they stopped competing internationally."

She said that her team was hoping to be a bit closer to the Norgies this year, especially after the results in Round 1. It did not happen, as the Norgies were still too strong.

The two other AAA Class teams, Femme Fatale with an all female lineup and coach Steve Hamilton, and Ernie Bernie, a local team from Tønsberg with Lise Nansen's husband Nicolai and three of his friends, had their internal competiton for the bronze medals. Trude Sviggum reported that Femme Fatale funneled the first exit and lost some valuable points right at the start: "They tried to catch up and won some rounds, but in the end Ernie Bernie were too strong for them." She finished her update with credit for the host: "It was a very well organized meet with good weather all week and a very nice closing ceremony and banquet at one of the hotels downtown Tønsberg."