posted Jan 10th, 2015 - The Sun Path Products NSL News made a field trip to Skydive Sebastian today, where SDC Rhythm XP was at the end of a winter training camp. Sunday is the last day of the first camp for this Rhythm lineup with coach Shannon Pilcher.

The 4-way world champion of 2006 has worked with Rhythm before, however, there is a major difference this time. The current Rhythm lineup (Janine and Steve Lefkowitz, Christy Frikken, Mikhail Markine, Thad Parker on camera) have started their third team year, and they have committed Shannon Pilcher for the complete 2015 season.

There is a very good reason why Rhythm is more dedicated than ever to use all available resources to get the most out of the 2015 season. Skydive Chicago, Rhythm's summer home and sponsor, is hosting the World Championship of Formation Skydiving 2016, and the team wants to compete for the US delegation on home turf. This means that SDC Rhythm XP has to win the USPA Nationals 2015 and take on Arizona Airspeed.

Every 4-way competitor in the world knows what it means to challenge Arizona Airspeed. It is a big job, and very few US teams and competitors have done this successfully in Airspeed history. In fact, Airspeed has been defeated at the USPA Nationals only six times in the 20 years between 1994 and 2014.

Mark Kirkby, Jack Jefferies, Dan BC and Kirk Verner dominated US 4-way competition between 1994 and 1999, followed by John Eagle, Mark Kirkby, Craig Girard and Neal Houston in 2000 and 2001. A power shift happened when the Golden Knights dropped 8-way and focused on 4-way after Airspeed's 8-way lineup had won the national championships over the US Army team since 1998, with one exception in 2001.

The Golden Knights 4-way lineup (John Hoover, Eric Heinscheimer, Chris Talbert, Kurt Isenburger) won the USPA Nationals 2002 and started a 5-year period without an Airspeed 4-way lineup on the top of the leaderboard at USPA Nationals. Craig Girard, Eliana Rodriguez, Mark Kirkby and Andy Delk changed that again in 2007, and Airspeed has won each US 4-way title ever since.

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World Meet 2006		Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	N-20-16	K-J-C-G-3	D-19-B-6	L-14-10	F-17-M-2	Total	Avg
1	DeLand Fire (US)	20	27	25	17	28	117	23.4
2	Gap Nice Icarius Autrement (FR)	17	25	23	21	25	111	22.2
3	Sinapsi PD (IT)	19	26	22	19	24	110	22.0
4	Sky Panthers Barkli (RU)	21	23	23	17	25	109	21.8
5	Arcteryx (NO)	18	25	21	17	24	105	21.0
6	Belgium Spa Hayabusa	19	25	18	17	23	102	20.4

Videos: NSL Talk with Shannon Pilcher - DeLand Fire in 2006

Two more US teams were a part of the time period when Airspeed left the USPA Nationals without 4-way gold medals. DeLand Majik won in 2003 and 2004, DeLand Fire in 2005 and 2006 (Solly Williams for Natasha Montgomery), and Shannon Pilcher was a team member of both world champion lineups, first as the alternate for DeLand Majik, then as Center Inside for DeLand Fire and DeLand Groove.

Shannon Pilcher has defeated Arizona Airspeed four times as a 4-way competitor, including his alternate position for DeLand Majik. However, SDC Rhythm XP was not even aware of this part of 4-way history when they decided to commit the coach for the 2015 season. They had other reasons for their decision.

The SDC Rhythm members explained that they were impressed with the progression of the Canadian national 4-way team Evolution. Shannon Pilcher has been working with the whole Canadian Lemay 4-way family even before Katie Woods joined the team at the end of the 2012 season. The success of the Evolution plan was the main reason to hire Shannon Pilcher for this important Rhythm year.

The former DeLand Majik and DeLand Fire members have all become very successful and experienced coaches. Gary Smith guided NMP-PCH Hayabusa to their biggest achievement in team history, the gold medals at the FAI World Championship of Formation Skydiving 2014. Shannon Pilcher's Canadian project ended with two bronze medals, and Evolution challenged Arizona Airspeed seriously in the 4-way Open competition.

The Sun Path Products NSL News spent some time only with coach Shannon Pilcher while SDC Rhythm XP was jumping. The video of the conversation can now be reviewed. The Rhythm members took some extra time at the end of the training day for more NSL Talk.

The Sun Path Products NSL News will follow up soon with the video of the team talk and of a recent training camp where SDC Rhythm XP and all Evolution members shared several hours of flying time at Paraclete XP. It seems to be strange to call this a player coaching project...