posted May 2nd, 2018 - The NSL News story on 23 April 2018 had covered the 1-point battle for bronze medals between Sweden and Switzerland at the FAI European Indoor Championship 2018 mostly from the perspective of the winner, Echochamber, including the videos of both teams' ten meet rounds.

The same story mentioned that Amnesya from Italy was heavily involved in the race for the bronze medals, as well, and finished only three points behind Airheads and four points behind Echochamber.

This update now follows up with the competition videos of the Italian team, and the audience has the opportunity to follow the roller-coaster trip that the NSL News mentioned in the earlier story:

"The ten rounds were a roller-coaster for Amnesya who were the fastest team out of the starting blocks (Rounds 1 - 2) and then lost the competition for the bronze medals in just the following two rounds. The Italian team won the total of the remaining six rounds (179 - 175 - 174) and was still too far behind after Round 4."

FAI European Indoor Championship 2018			1		2		3		4		5		6		7		8		9		10		Total		Avg
Rank	AAA Class		G,12,20		F,16,22		N,E,D,21		17,L,4		18,14,O		19,2,5		7,15,Q		6,B,M,P		K,11,9		8,H,J,C		Total		Avg
1	Aerodyne Realfly	FR	25		29		39		31		26		26		32		45		33		38		324		32.4
2	Black Cat	RU	23		31		36		32		25		26		32		46		30		35		316		31.6
3	Echochamber	SE	21	-1	26		34		27		23		23	-1	29	-2	38	-1	27	-2	35	-1	283	-8	28.3
4	Airheads	CH	21	-2	26		35		26	-1	22	-2	23		29		40	-1	28	-2	32	-4	282	-12	28.2
5	Amnesya	IT	21	-1	28		29	-2	22	-3	24		22		29	-1	39	-2	27	-2	38	-3	279	-14	27.9
6	ACM Weembi	UK	19		24		29		24		20		22		29		35		25		28		255		25.5
7	FlySpot Sky4Four	PL	16		18		20		19		17		16		21		25		21		20		193		19.3
8	Skydive University Slovakia	SK	14		18		21		17		15		14		19		27		21		25		191		19.1
9	Norway	NO	13		14		19		13		14		15		16		26		19		15		164		16.4
10	HF Bad Boys	CZ	16		22		22		21		-		-		-		-		-		-		81		20.3

Amnesya ended up with a total of 14 point deductions, while bronze medal winner Echochamber was the cleanest of the three contenders. Echochamber member Ulf Liljenbäck said later that his team's recent attention to a cleaner performance paid out well.

The meet videos of the Italian team also shine more light on the technical execution of some of the blocks, which were a part of yesterday's update and covered the astonishing 10-point damage that the HF Cubs suffered in Round 4 at the same event in the 4-way Junior competition.

Amnesya is one of the very well trained young teams that follow the coaching and guidance of the best 4-way competitors and most experienced coaches in the world.

Their block techniques resemble much of NMP PCH HayaBusa's style, and the Italians have worked closely together with HayaBusa's inside center David Grauwels, who is also coaching the Czech 4-way teams here and there.

In fact, most of the top teams in the world apply similar techniques for the blocks and the piece-flying, and they are always looking for ways how to become better and faster. Amnesya demonstrated once again and naturally in Norway how the most current block techniques look like on the judging videos.

Even the critical Block 8 (Canadian T - Canadian T), which turned out to be so harmful for the HF Cubs, looks very similar compared to the Czech technique, where the grip connection is not visible at parts of the inter.

The 4-way Open Class teams had to execute Block 8 in the last round of the meet, and Amnesya tied the 38-pointer highscore of the French national team in 4-way Open, Aerodyne Realfly.

There are also several other opportunities where the teams, competitors, judges and audience can see how similar modern techniques are being applied for other blocks, such as the compressed accordion pieces (11, 12, 13, 16). The flying techniques all follow the same goal to minimize the size of the piece and fly it fast and efficiently.

There is no piece that would survive the execution of a block with the applied energy and pace intact without a strong and solid grip connection, and the modern techniques are naturally hiding these grip connections during the inter without any intention of violating the rules. The judges seem to acknowledge this for the best teams in the world, while they seem to have doubts in other cases, unless there are other reasons for the point deductions.

Amnesya will most likely continue to apply the same modern techniques for outdoor competition, as well, as they now prepare for the national outdoor championships and the next showdown with eX3MO in Italy...