posted Jan 23rd, 2013 - The start of the 2013 outdoor competition season is just around the corner. The two indoor meets at the Sportflight Skydive Arena in the Czech Republic and at SkyVenture New Hampshire generated the first leaderboards this year, and another indoor competition will be next, the Paraclete XP Indoor Championship 2013.

Mostly French teams have their annual Aerokart Indoor Championship at the end of February in Paris, and the Canadian Indoor Nationals are scheduled for the beginning of March.

Arizona Airspeed's new lineup will post the first outdoor scores of the 2013 season at the annual Valentine's Meet on home turf before the trip to the Paraclete XP Outdoor Championship 2013, as usual with the traditional Shamrock Showdown Skins Game, which will once again attract an international field of teams to DeLand in mid March.

Paraclete XP Outdoor 2012		Rd. 1	Rd. 2	Rd. 3	Rd. 4	Rd. 5	Rd. 6	Rd. 7	Rd. 8	Rd. 9	Rd. 10	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	Q,8,H,22	16,19,13	10,14,2	E,C,20,K	5,M,9	A,6,F,17	D,21,N,B	P,O,G,J,1	18,4,7	12,15,3	Total	Avg
1	Arizona Airspeed (US)	25	20	18	35	36	25	33	31	23	20	266	26.6
2	NMP-PCH Hayabusa (BE)	23	21	20	33	34	29	30	30	20	21	261	26.1
3	Aerodyne Aerokart (FR)	23	21	19	33	29	28	28	29	23	21	254	25.4

The first opportunity to see where Arizona Airspeed and SDC Rhythm XP stand with their complete new linups is the Paraclete XP Outdoor Championship 2013 in March. Airspeed will compete with the new lineup at the indoor competition next weekend in Raeford, however, Rhythm is still missing Christy Frikken at the beginning of February. Brian Johnson will fill in for her at Center Inside.

Both lineups will be complete in DeLand and ready for the first outdoor showdown this year. The event will also be an opportunity to see another new lineup in outdoor action for the first time. Canada's national team Evolution has the Paraclete XP Outdoor Championship 2013 on the team's meet schedule.

Katie Woods has now been fully integrated and competed for Evolution in Singapore for the first time. The March event will be the first outdoor competition for the new lineup.

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The other international top contenders will watch the Canadian scores and videos very carefully. Evolution could easily and quickly become one of the main challengers of the established top teams in the world. NMP-PCH Hayabusa will most likely miss the competition in DeLand this year, as Andy Grauwels is recovering from a surgery, and France is still in the process of putting together the new national teams in 4way Open and 8way for the next two years.

Arizona Airspeed and Evolution might both compete for medals at the World Championship of Formation Skydiving 2014. The first results of the new NSL Poll show that Airspeed is not expected to have the same dominating position in the near future as it was in the past two years. The Airspeed lineup of 2011 and 2012 was undefeated at outdoor competitions. At least NMP-PCH Hayabusa is considered to perform on gold medal level.

The same could count for the Canadian national team, and the first outdoor scores at the Paraclete XP Outdoor Championship 2013 will indicate what can be expected from the new Evolution lineup.

Singapore 2012		Rd. 1	Rd. 2	Rd. 3	Rd. 4	Rd. 5	Rd. 6	Rd. 7	Rd. 8	Rd. 9	Rd. 10	Rd. 11	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	10,5,O	12,D,L,22	21,A,M,14	17,3,7	K,16,18	2,Q,N,F	C,P,B,G,15	E,1,11	C,F,P,6	L,10,E,19	9,1,13	Total	Avg
1	Arizona Airspeed	30	29	32	30	27	41	39	28	44	30	29	359	32.6
2	SDC Rhythm XP	26	25	28	27	24	38	38	26	44	28	25	329	29.9
3	Evolution	27	24	29	27	24	35	36	26	42	29	26	325	29.6

The previous Evolution lineup with father Michel Lemay in the Center Inside slot was already considered the 4th best team in the world by the NSL News audience. The new lineup with Katie Woods in the Point slot will train more, has higher goals and is expected to do even better.

The first scores in Singapore came after very little training and were still promising. The situation will be much different in March. Coach Shannon Pilcher is currently in Montreal to work with the team for several days. Evolution has also scheduled outdoor training in DeLand before and after the March competition and will be well prepared for the first confrontation with Airspeed.

All top teams will then once again travel to Bodyflight Bedford where they can meet NMP-PCH Hayabusa for the first time this year at the World Challenge 2013. It would not be a surprise if Evolution also signed up for the Dynamic 4way event in Bedford...