posted Dec 11th, 2016 - The FAI World Championship of Formation Skydiving has always been the most relevant competition in the sport, even at the times when it was embedded into a Mondial. The real world champions are the winners of this event, and the national 4-way teams of all countries are proud to be a part of the world meets and have their own battles in the field for and behind the medal positions.

The world meets are naturally the main goal of a 2-year cycle, and the teams invest all of their energy and resources in the actual competition. The world meets are then usually the conclusion of a competition season for the national 4-way and 8-way teams.

It is not easy for any national team to come up with enough motivation and energy to attend additional meets after a world meet, and sometimes there is even more and new pressure when domestic challengers are waiting to take on the defending champions and national teams. Arizona Airspeed and Black Cat had their national championships scheduled after this year's world meet, and both teams defended their titles successfully.

FAI Mondial 2016			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	4-way Open		12,A,16	18,15,O	1,F,E,C	17,B,14	10,2,20	21,11,G	J,5,19	L,M,K,7	D,8,4	3,13,Q	Total	Avg
1	NMP PCH HayaBusa	BE	24	25	35	26	19	22	27	39	23	22	262	26.2
2	Arizona Airspeed	US	21	23	31	26	18	22	27	40	23	23	254	25.4
3	France	FR	21	20	30	21	18	21	27	39	21	20	238	23.8
4	Black Cat	RU	22	20	30	24	17	21	24	33	21	19	231	23.1
5	Qatar Tigers	QA	21	20	30	24	17	20	23	36	17	18	226	22.6
6	Evolution	CA	20	18	29	24	16	18	23	32	18	16	214	21.4
7	Satori XL	UK	18	19	27	24	16	18	22	30	18	18	210	21.0
8	Airbus	DE	16	18	29	19	15	18	22	29	14	19	199	19.9
9	Savolo	ZA	15	15	25	19	14	15	16	28	17	15	179	17.9
10	Final Fire	AT	16	15	25	17	12	16	18	29	17	13	178	17.8
11	Ex3mo	IT	18	15	21	18	13	14	19	25	17	14	174	17.4
12	Rotor Out	AU	16	16	24	14	13	16	18	22	14	13	166	16.6
13	Pangaea	DK	15	16	24	19	11	13	16	25	12	13	164	16.4
14	China	CN	14	15	21	15	12	11	16	24	12	12	152	15.2
15	M4trix	NL	13	13	16	11	11	12	14	20	12	12	134	13.4
16	H4O	IE	13	13	17	8	9	12	9	15	10	10	116	11.6
17	MeXtreme	MX	8	8	13	8	9	9	9	12	8	7	91	9.1

FAI/IPC had also scheduled the FAI Indoor World Cup 2016 a month after the Mondial, and it was no big surprise that only three national 4-way Open Class teams in Ottawa (NMP PCH HayaBusa, France, Qatar Tigers) competed again at Flyspot, this time for FAI indoor medals.

The teams in 4-way Women had more energy still available, as four of the eleven teams in Ottawa (French Girls, NFTO, No Mercy, CZ Ladies) also traveled to Poland a month later. A total of 28 national 4-way teams competed at the Mondial, and seven of them attended the indoor world cup.

Other national 4-way teams volunteered for additional events at different locations. The Dutch national team M4trix added the ISR Grand Prix 2016 to the meet agenda after the world meet, which took place very close to home in Roosendaal.

ISR Grand Prix 2016			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class		A,17,9	12,P,L,18	C,B,O,11	14,21,M	6,K,D,E	N,3,J,D	22,16,F	7,Q,H,2	Total	Avg
1	Thunder ISR	BE	35	23	33	25	33	28	26	31	234	29.3
2	Flying Squad	FR	31	22	30	22	31	26	20	26	208	26.0
3	Amnesya	IT	24	19	22	21	30	22	19	27	184	23.0
4	Energy Garzigliana	IT	26	19	24	21	27	20	19	25	181	22.6
5	Monaco Tunnel Team	MC	23	18	24	19	25	19	17	23	168	21.0
6	M4trix	NL	22	16	21	18	23	19	16	21	156	19.5
7	Flyzone Les Affranchis	FR	20	16	22	19	22	15	17	21	152	19.0
8	Ludo's Pinkcakes Deluxe	DE	17	13	22	16	21	17	14	19	139	17.4
9	Murphy Mania	NL	19	13	18	16	20	14	14	17	131	16.4
9	Crash Test Dummies	BE	17	13	19	15	19	15	14	19	131	16.4
11	Hoppaaaa	BE	14	11	17	14	18	14	12	18	118	14.8
12	Cool Runnings	NL	16	11	11	14	15	11	14	13	105	13.1
13	Blue Rebels	GR	14	10	13	13	15	11	10	14	100	12.5

M4trix was actually the only national 4-way team at the ISR Grand Prix. Winner Thunder ISR has been behind NMP PCH HayaBusa in Belgium, and Flying Squad was an international lineup. Amnesya and Energy from Italy try to catch national team Ex3mo, and Monaco is a part of France at FAI/IPC sanctioned international skydiving competition.

The Blue Rebels from Greece are the best 4-way team in their country but have not made it to the FAI World Championships of Formation Skydiving yet, where Mexico entered the 4-way Open Class competition for the first time.

The FAI Mondial 2016 was the first world meet for M4trix, even though there were only two world meet 4-way rookies in the lineup (Annelies Hasewinkel, Jaap Keuter). Leon van Leeuwen and Mechie Voermans competed with Whooops at the Mondial 2012 in Dubai before they joined M8trix and then formed M4trix. Jaap Keuter had international 4-way experience with M4trix at the FAI World Cup 2015, while the Mondial 2016 was the first international 4-way competition for the newest M4trix team member, Annelies Hasewinkel.