posted May 30th, 2017 - The Sun Path Products NSL News brought the "Project Dutch FS4 20 Plus" to the attention of the audience for the first time on 5 January 2017. Former Dutch national 4-way competitors Erwin van den Braak and Alex Egberink launched the program this year, and the selection of the lineups was scheduled for January 21st.

The project has made great progress ever since the selection and the Sun Path Products NSL News will catch up with the details step by step, beginning with the lineups.

The original concept for the project included two teams, with a total of eight participants and two videographers. One team would attend the meets, and a farm team would be open for an ongoing selection process. The selection of the participants was planned to be based on a combination of talent, commitment and personality/attitude.

The project managers decided to run the selection in a 1-on-1 indoor format with Weembi Lille member Roy Janssen. Registration for the selection began during the ISR Grand Prix 2016.

More than 20 candidates registered for the first selection event on the January 21 weekend.

Erwin van den Braak and Alex Egberink were excited to see such great interest in the new 4-way project, as they did not know what could be expected after the planning was completed.

They had a colorful mixture of new skydivers and highly experienced 4-way competitors to select from.

The project was mainly created for talent development, while 4-way experience still had a high priority, as well. Sharing knowledge and competition experiences was important for the beginning stage of the project.

Project manager Erwin van den Braak said that the news of Thunder ISR's end of the team career had an impact on the project plans. Paul Hofstee and Jacco van Eerden said that they would be available and willing to commit to the project.

This resulted in the decision to form three teams instead of two, and Team Orange brought together the event managers Erwin van den Braak and Alex Egberink with the former Thunder ISR members Jacco van Eerden and Paul Hofstee.

4-way progression of Dutch 4-way national teams at all world meets since 1985

The inclusion of Team Orange brings naturally a wealth of knowledge and 4-way experience to the project. Team Orange will be able to set high standards and share with the younger 4-way generation.

A total of 14 Dutch 4-way competitors and two videographers were eventually selected for the four project teams and stand for the baseline of future talent development and top 4-way competition in the Netherlands.

Team Red (Laura Surink, Koen Spruit, Sofia van der Vlist, Jacky Cortel) is the farm team with competitors of a new Dutch 4-way generation. Team Blue (Mandy Feijen, Danny Dorfel, Mechie Voermans, Leon van Leeuwen) is a more experienced lineup and will train enough to increase the previous Dutch 4-way scoring level. Team Blue will also represent the Netherlands at the FAI World Cup 2017 in Saarlouis. Bart Daenen will be on camera for Team Blue and Jeroen van Dijk for Team Orange.

The 4th project team will be developed only with indoor training and competition at the beginning. Ralf Pijnenburg and Rick Verbunt plan to train regularly with two members of Team Orange as player coaches.

Team Orange launched the training with a camp in Eloy and 84 jumps. Arizona Airspeed member Niklas Hemlin was coaching the team. Orange then followed up with a 4-day camp on Texel last weekend and completed additional 44 jumps in four days.

Niklas Hemlin has not been the only coach for the project. NMP PCH HayaBusa members Dennis Praet and his team mate David Grauwels are also working with the teams, as well as Luc Verstrepen. Pete Allum and Roy Janssen are on the wish list. The work with different coaches will help the project teams to find their own styles and techniques.

Team Orange is mainly focusing on the FAI World Meet 2018 in Australia. Block training and specific development of the pieces are still in the works, and meet specific training is still far away.

However, the Dutch Nationals 2017 at the beginning of September are still the qualifier for the world meet and will show who compete for the Netherlands at Gold Coast next year. Team Orange will most likely be at the 20+ level in September...