posted Sep 2nd, 2013 - Another interesting week is beginning. The German Nationals 2013 are scheduled for the week days, with the first round coming tomorrow morning. As soon as the German Nationals are over, the ESL Championship will begin on Saturday morning. The Russian Nationals will also be held this week.

There is no serious competition for Barkli in Russia, and the ESL Championship in Moorsele, Belgium, is a friendly meet for all teams who would like to attend a fun international competition and try to help each country's delegation to win the ESL Spirit.

The situation is different in Germany where the winning team qualifies as the national team for the World Championship of Formation Skydiving 2014 in Prostejov. The stakes are high, and two teams are expected to give each other a tough battle for the 1st place in the AAA/Open Class.

The Sun Path Products NSL News covered the situation in Germany with an update on 1 April 2013. The new EADS lineup was training in DeLand to begin with preparations for this year's national championships. The Paratec-Saar lineup of the past years, Germany's national team, had disbanded at this point in time, and the top spot was open.

The situation in Germany looked differently a month later. The update on 6 May 2013 brought Paratec-Saar back into the picture. The team's rear piece, Joern Thiele and Markus Bastuck, had decided to continue and re-build the lineup.

Former ISB Air Remscheid members Anne Heinrich and Petra van Overveld joined Paratec-Saar and had to learn their new slots in the front piece. However, it was a very promising and talented combination, and EADS would most likely have serious competition.

German Nationals 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	8,G,L,3	15,9,11	M,H,A,12	22,F,7	Q,D,5,21	2,J,P,14	O,17,8	N,4,6	1,13,E	K,10,16	Total	Avg
1	Paratec-Saar (DE)	18	17	24	19	20	19	19	17	18	15	186	18.6
2	EADS (DE)	16	17	23	17	19	17	19	18	16	16	178	17.8

Things changed again for Paratec-Saar when Anne Heinrich had to step back a few weeks ago due to an injury. Solly Williams, who is on his way to Germany, reported that Paratec-Saar's Center Outside of the past years, Dieter Schwarz, is helping out and came back to take his original slot.

Petra van Overveld has moved back to her Point slot, and all current team members are now in their most familiar positions. The competition for EADS has probably become even more challenging, as the reigning champion and national team of many years is back with a very strong lineup.

However, EADS has been training with the new team (Göran Meyer, Olaf Biedermann, Thomas Mack, Christian Schaefer, Andreas Troegele on camera) all year and might have the strongest lineup in team history. EADS was already closer to the original Paratec-Saar lineup than the national team may have liked and expected it at the German Nationals 2012. It could be even closer this week...