posted Jun 22nd, 2005 - The Florida Skydiving League was facing an unusual situation at the fourth meet of the 2005 season last Saturday at Skydive City in Zephyrhills. It was a summer meet, and there was no weather threat. No hurricanes were trying to make the FSL life miserable. In addition, an expectedly high number of ten teams attended the meet in Zephtrhills.

There were more unusual events taking place at Skydive City the same day. The NSL News on June 17 had already announced that a new team would join the FSL teams for the June meet. Black Magick followed up on the promise and showed up Saturday morning ready to challenge the other two A Class teams in Z-Hills.

Black Magick with Thomas Hughes (Outside Center), Joey Jones (Inside Center), Juliana Se (Tail) and Joel Tambor (Point) surely received the attention the team deserved for its efforts to show that the current Formation Skydiving dive pool can be mastered not only by belly-flying.

Whenever Black Magick landed after a competition round, the FSL crowd gathered at the dubbing station to see what the five freefly artists had to offer. It was more than only fun for the team members and entertainment for the audience. Black Magick was quite competitive in the A Class.

Zero Tolerance Miami with Alex Batista, Gary Hansen, Angel Molina, Lance Smith and Dutch Vandervelt on their bellies had to come up with the team's highest meet average of the 2005 season (4.8) to hold off the charging Black Magick by one single point after six rounds.

It was quite impressive to watch how the freeflyers mastered the four blocks in the six rounds that required piece flying (Blocks 4, 6, 19, 21). Highlight was the score of six points in round six, including Block 4 (Monopod - Monopod), where Black Magick tied the A Class highscore of the round. The NSL-TV coverage of the FSL meet will begin very soon and include the jumps of Black Magick.

The A Class competition included more special events. The winner with a 6.3 meet average was the local pickup team "4 NO's". The team's line-up included father and son, Derek and Kyle Thomas, doing family center work, Derek as the Inside Center, Kyle as the Outside Center. Jody Conn (Tail) and Laura Song (Point) completed the 4 NO's line-up.

The competition in the AA Class was more spread out than in the A Class. FSC Wind Damaged with Mike Green (Center Outside), Joel Kmetz (Center Inside), Martin McKerrell (Point), Bruce Robertson (Tail) and Mike Mathes (Video) has taken a dominating position in Florida and finished the meet in Z-Hills with a new team record of 9.3 average. The first double-digit meet average is now on the team's agenda and realistically in sight. The Lake Wales team is currently positioned in 10th place of the national rankings in its first AA Class season.

Home team Z-Hills CTRL-Z had to replace Paul Bertorelli and Bill Bickner and managed to maintain the scoring level of the previous FSL meets with a 7.0 average on home turf. Geronimo is another new local team. Texas Skydiving League 4-way veteran and TSL staff writer Sherry "Doc" Dodson guided Andrea Ferreira (Point), Mario Luppa (Center Outside) and Alexis Nahama (Tail) through this competition. John O'Donnel was on video for Geronimo.

The AAA Class competition at Skydive City included another new and very promising team with its 2005 debut. Team Z-Hills consists of experienced 4-way competitors: Al Brooks - Center Inside, Ron Hill - Point, Steve Johnston - Center Outside, Jim Klinge - Tail.

Al Brooks trained and competed with Elsinore Matrix on the U.S. 4-way top level before he moved to Florida and took a long break. Ron Hill was a Frost member and entertained himself with a Teiwaz membership when Frost was discontinued. Steve Johnston has trained and competed with other high-profile Z-Hills line-ups in the past years. Jim Klinge was a Dallas Thunder member in 2004 and moved to Florida this year.

Team Z-Hills opened its 2005 meet season after a few short training camps and some tunnel time at SkyVenture Orlando. The outcome was more than promising with a 17.5 meet average. Last weekend's competition draw was on the faster side and allowed many teams to post new record scores. For Team Z-Hills it was the opportunity to begin the 2005 season with confidence.

Teiwa-Z-Hills showed up with two line-ups once again. Teiwaz Purple included Pamela Manos who visited from Skydive Miami in Homestead. It was her first 4-way competition after many years. Pam's husband Guy Manos was a 4-way world champion with the DeLand Air Bears in 1985 and then became a Hollywood moviemaker and stuntman. "Dropzone" was the last and most famous Manos production. Pamela Manos' first 4-way competition in the AAA Class ended up with almost exactly the same meet average as Guy's with the Air Bears in 1985: 11.8 at the end of the six rounds in Skydive City.

The other Teiwa-Z-Hills line-up "Pink" was almost an Arizona Blade reunion. Natasha Montgomery, Thomas Hughes and Robert Healy won the NSL Championship 2004 with Mark Kirkby in the Center Inside position. Original Teiwaz member Kurt Gaebel was invited by the three current world class competitors to take a ride in Kirkby's former slot.

Natasha Montgomery formed DeLand Fire for the 2005 season, which includes Thomas Hughes in the video and alternate slot. Former Blade tail Robert Healy has taken the same slot for DeLand Majik in 2005. Fire and Majik are both aiming for the gold medals at this year's USPA Championship and qualification as the U.S. national team.

Healy has been a Teiwaz member for several years, while Montgomery joined the Teiwa-Z-Hills Pink line-up already for this year's FSL May meet. Hughes had his first appearance with Teiwa-Z-Hills last Saturday, which made the competition a 12-round affair for the Black Magick freefly artist.

The Pink line-up had to go through three different videographers during the meet when Teiwaz videographer Jay Kaplan had problems with his ears after the first two rounds. Six points were lost due to invisible formations. However, it was mostly meant to be a unique fun affair for this Pink line-up, and the 18.5 average was at least a new record average for any Teiwaz line-up in the team's history.

Kachina included two more 4-way world class competitors with DeLand Majik member David VanGreuningen and Sinapsi PD member Pete Allum. The NSL News will follow up soon with more Kachina information and a team profile.