posted Jan 3rd, 2016 - One piece of the World Air Games 2015 aftermath is still missing. The Sun Path Products NSL News has regularly posted a combined AAA Class leaderboard after events where the AAA Class teams, who apply the same FAI/IPC Open Class dive pool and competition sequences, were still separated in different categories.

This was once again the case at the World Air Games, where the gender separation caused two different leaderboards, 4-way Open and 4-way Women.

To be more correct: It is not really a gender separation, as female 4-way, 8-way and VFS competitors are still members of Open Class lineups (Laurence Herve, Janine Tillenburg, Emmanuelle Droneau).

However, the identical competition sequences of the 10-round meet allow a direct comparison between the teams in both categories, who also competed at the same time and at the same place in Dubai.

World Air Games 2015			Rd. 1	Rd. 2	Rd. 3	Rd. 4	Rd. 5	Rd. 6	Rd. 7	Rd. 8	Rd. 9	Rd. 10	T.	Avg
R.	AAA Class		B,C,17,2	N,19,4	13,14,F	6,E,O,L	7,1,A	D,18,P,22	M,H,5,15	16,9,12	21,K,G,Q	11,20,3	T.	Avg
1	NMP PCH Hayabusa	BE	29	26	23	36	28	23	31	24	27	22	269	26.9
2	Arizona Airspeed	US	29	27	22	36	28	19	29	25	30	20	265	26.5
3	Black Cat	RU	23	23	21	30	21	21	26	23	27	19	234	23.4
1	Golden Knights	US	25	21	22	25	23	19	29	21	25	17	227	22.7
2	French FLY-IN Girls	FR	25	22	21	30	21	20	20	22	25	18	224	22.4
4	Qatar Tigers	QA	22	21	17	28	23	19	27	19	21	17	214	21.4
5	Evolution	CA	21	22	17	28	20	15	24	20	22	16	205	20.5
7	FLY-IN	FR	24	20	18	29	20	17	19	19	22	-	188	20.9
6	Dubai Asaar Black	AE	21	20	17	20	20	17	23	19	20	17	194	19.4
3	P. Montreal Fuzion	CA	16	19	16	26	18	12	21	16	14	13	171	17.1
8	Vision 99	UK	18	12	15	23	18	15	18	17	-	-	136	17.0
9	Rotor Out	AU	17	16	14	22	17	15	21	13	-	-	135	16.9
4	NFTO	UK	18	17	15	20	18	15	17	14	19	12	165	16.5
10	Ex3mo	IT	16	16	12	21	16	17	14	15	-	-	127	15.9
5	Infra Red Band	RU	17	15	12	20	12	14	17	13	16	-	136	15.1
11	AtomiX YUU	DE	14	12	14	20	16	13	17	14	-	-	120	15.0
6	Dubai Asaar Ladies	AE	12	12	9	14	11	11	10	12	-	-	91	11.4

The combined leaderboard still cannot consider all circumstances perfectly. The number of rounds is not the same for all teams on the combined AAA Class leaderboard. Both categories had their own separate cuts after Round 8 and Round 9.

Russia's Infra Red Band would not have advanced into the semifinals without the 4-way Women category. NFTO and Parachute Montreal Fuzion would have missed the final round in the Open Class, while Golden Knights and French FLY-IN Girls both easily made it to Round 10.

In fact, the 4th place of the Golden Knights on the combined leaderboard in Dubai was the best ranking that an all-female team has ever achieved since the introduction of the new category in 2001.

Not even the famous French national team of 2010, Deep Blue, came close to the 4th place of the Golden Knights. The French Girls of 2014 finished one single point behind the French Open Class team in 5th place as the best French 4-way Women placing.

World Meet 2014		Rd. 1	Rd. 2	Rd. 3	Rd. 4	Rd. 5	Rd. 6	Rd. 7	Rd. 8	Rd. 9	Rd. 10	Total	Avg
Rank	4-way AAA	E,3,C,5	F,6,D,21	19,H,2	M,4,1	O,14,A,P	8,J,16	7,11,12	22,20,15	17,G,18	13,B,9	Total	Avg
1	NMP-PCH Hayabusa (BE)	32	29	25	25	33	25	22	18	26	29	264	26.4
2	Arizona Airspeed (US)	31	27	25	24	31	23	22	17	24	29	253	25.3
3	Evolution (CA)	31	28	24	22	28	23	20	21	25	27	249	24.9
4	VoltR (FR)	24	26	18	23	26	20	20	13	24	21	215	21.5
5	French Girls (FR)	21	25	22	20	27	21	18	17	19	24	214	21.4
5	Barkli (RU)	24	23	20	22	25	21	19	16	18	26	214	21.4
7	Golden Knights (US)	22	25	21	21	23	18	16	15	19	24	204	20.4
8	Dubai Asaar Black (AE)	18	20	17	17	20	14	15	13	17	20	171	17.1

The new French FLY-IN Girls needed only a few months to get to the same 5th place in the combined WAG rankings that the previous French Girls lineup claimed at the World Meet in Prostejov 2014, and the 22.4 average is already significantly higher.

The different number of meet rounds made the meet averages at the World Air Games the more realistic factor for the combined rankings, which held true with one exception.

Evolution was one point ahead of FLY-IN after Round 9 and had a lower 10-round average due to the slow sequence in Round 10.

Infra Red Band and AtomiX were tied after Round 8, and the 16-pointer in Round 9 is the reason why the Russian team has a slightly higher meet average.