posted Dec 29th, 2017 - The search for the ultimate 4-way world champion of the year brought up a topic that even extends the combination of 4-way outdoor and indoor competition.

The NSL News mentioned in the same story that Black Cat is also competing in 8-way with Russia's national team Tanay:

"Four of the Black Cat members (Valentin Ilin, Vasily Korotkov, Vladimir Pavlenko, Evgeny Stashchenko) will probably earn the title of the all-round multi-event competitors of the year."

It would not be fair to reward this unofficial title to the Russian national 4-way team based on the fact that Belgian's FlyIn Machine 44 will not continue the 8-way project in 2018. NMP PCH HayaBusa and ISR FireFlash competed in 4-way indoor and outdoor this year, and so did their 8-way combination.

The Black Cat members may be the top candidates for the 4-way all-round title in 2018; however, HayaBusa and FireFlash both still have to be considered in terms of the combined Formation Skydiving all-round competition.

The NSL News took a closer look at the teams that competed in all three events this year after the discussion of the all-round title began.

Rank	Teams - Combined		4-way Outd.	4-way Ind.	8-way Outd.	Average
1	NMP PCH HayaBusa	BE	26.2	32.8	18.1	25.7
2	Black Cat	RU	21.3	29.0	19.7	23.3
3	Golden Knights	US	22.3	25.9	21.1	23.1
4	Arizona Airspeed	US	25.2	29.2	14.7	23.0
5	ISR FireFlash	BE	18.0	24.4	18.1	20.2
6	Airbus	DE	19.2	21.9	13.7	18.3

Once again, the situation is very similar compared to other topics where the HayaBusa name is a part of the story. The official FAI/IPC world champions from Belgium have distanced themselves just as much in the combined 4-way indoor/outdoor/8-way rankings from other contenders, this time together with their 8-way partners of ISR FireFlash.

Black Cat is in the deserved 2nd place, even though there is a big gap between the Belgians and all other teams. It becomes all the more interesting behind HayaBusa, where Golden Knights and Arizona Airspeed are both very close behind the Russians.

It is also an interesting aspect that FlyIn Machine 44 is the only 8-way team that consists of two complete 4-way lineups who are both listed in the Top 6 rankings.

Black Cat's Tanay 8-way partners are not training together in 4-way, even though they compete in 4-way at the Russian Nationals and other meets. The same counts for the Golden Knights whose focus is mainly on 8-way training and competition. Kurt Isenbarger is not even in the active 8-way lineup any longer and serves as 8-way coach and alternate.

Arizona Airspeed's 8-way lineup is always a mixture of different Airspeed generations, which comes together only at the USPA Nationals.

The last listed team in the ultimate all-round rankings is Airbus from Germany, and the German situation is the same as for Black Cat, Golden Knights and Arizona Airspeed. Airbus is training mainly in one event (4-way) and adds former members and experienced 8-way competitors to the 8-way lineup.

Only Markus Bastuck, Thomas Mack and Goran Meyer won the German 8-way title this year, and Max Thiele replaced his brother Jorn. Olaf Biedermann, Christian Schafer, Steffen Schiedeck and Thomas Spielvogel completed the lineup, with Andreas Trogele on camera.

The Belgian concept of two complete and well trained 4-way teams joining in 8-way seems to be a successful recipe...