posted May 21st, 2017 - The indoor competition season is not over yet, as more countries are still holding their national indoor championships before the outdoor season begins.

The latest scores came from Russia and Italy, and both events featured very exciting battles for the top spot. The Sun Path Products NSL News begins with a closer look at the competition in Italy before the review of the Russian Indoor Nationals.

Three of the Italian top contenders attended the national indoor championships, and two of them finished with team record averages on the top of the leaderboard after a 1-point battle over ten rounds.

Ninja 5 has only competed at indoor events so far, while Fly-In Amnesya and Ex3mo are also jumping from planes. In fact, Ex3mo is Italy's defending outdoor champion, and Amnesya is planning to challenge Ex3mo for the gold medals this year and qualify as the national team for the FAI World Meet 2018 in Australia.

Italian Indoor Nationals 2017		1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	4,J,C,E	15,21,9	H,B,18,19	11,5,12	10,M,G,P	D,F,17,N	13,2,A	3,L,O,22	16,K,20	6,Q,14	Total	Avg
1	Ninja 4	31	26	24	21	30	37	22	25	24	26	266	26.6
2	Fly-In Amnesya	31	21	27	21	31	35	23	24	25	27	265	26.5
3	Ex3mo	28	22	22	19	28	33	21	19	21	26	239	23.9
4	FastWeb Aero Gravity Pink	25	18	21	16	21	28	16	19	16	19	199	19.9
5	Sintesi	21	19	18	17	20	25	18	16	17	19	190	19.0
6	Salem	21	17	18	13	21	25	16	18	16	19	184	18.4
Rank	A Class	G,B,P	L,E,11	7,H	O,4	K,2	14,C	20,F	8,19	15,6	Q,D,J	Total	Avg
1	Irmiruan	16	13	20	16	15	15	11	12	13	25	156	15.6

Ninja 4 and Amnesya know each other from the Wind Games 2017 where Ninja 4 competed with Pete Allum, Mario Fatorusso, Livio Piccolo and Ivan Quadrio in the lineup and finished far ahead (250 - 219) of Amnesya.

However, three months later the situation was completely different. The challenger came much closer than the different Ninja 4 lineup might have expected. Luca Marchioro replaced Pete Allum at the indoor nationals, and Ninja 4 still increased the team's meet average from 25.0 to 26.6 last week.

This was still barely enough to hold off the new Italian top team that had caught the attention of the Sun Path Products NSL News after an impressive performance at the French Indoor Nationals 2017 at Weembi Lille.

The next Amnesya statement was even stronger at the World Challenge 2017 where the team finished with a 23.9 average.

Ninja 4 did not compete after the Wind Games and had to be surprised that Amnesya came to the national indoor championships even better prepared than in Bedford. Ninja 4 was one single point ahead after Round 5 and had to work hard to barely save a 1-point lead over the finish line.

Ex3mo was not even a factor in the battle for the indoor championship title. However, the national 4-way champions are outdoor experts, and Amnesya is aware of the next difficult task that has the outdoor gold medals as the main goal in 2017.

Ninja 4 has no plans to travel to Canada and compete at the FAI Indoor World Meet, which means that Amnesya will most likely represent Italy for the first time at an FAI event, which would be another highlight for the team.

Before that, the national outdoor championships will be the qualifier for Australia 2018, and Ex3mo and 620 will do everything possible to stop the new top contender from taking the outdoor top spot in Italy. A very exciting national outdoor championship can be expected this year in Italy...