posted Jan 18th, 2019 - The NSL News story on January 16th pointed out two recent 4-way family situations, one of the Pro Team from Finland and the other one between HF Flying Circus and HF Bad Boys in the Czech Republic. Father and son Kimmo and Kalle Pohjola train and compete together in Finland, while Jan and Jakub Klapka are opponents in the Czech Republic.

Another friendly battle of the 4-way generations has been going on in the Czech Republic for a while, and the situation is very similar to the one between HF Flying Circus and HF Bad Boys.

The recent January meet of the World Tunnel League at the Hurricane Factory featured the latest battle between two generations of 4-way competitors who are officially separated in their respective competition categories at FAI/IPC events.

HF Chicks have been the Czech national team in 4-way Women for several years, while HF Cubs compete for the Czech Republic in 4-way Junior at FAI/IPC events. However, the World Tunnel League events have brought both teams together on the same leaderboards ever since the HF Cubs moved up into the AAA Class competition world in November 2018.

World Tunnel League January 2019			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class		Q,E,F,18	3,9,11	D,K,21,16	14,G,M,17	O,L,B,7	5,15,6	P,A,12,20	C,13,1	10,8,N	22,J,H,4	Total	Avg
1	Pro Team	FI	34	20	27	24	37	23	19	23	20	21	248	24.8
2	HF Flying Circus	CZ	34	21	23	25	39	19	21	22	21	21	246	24.6
3	HF Bad Boys	CZ	31	21	22	23	33	19	21	19	19	19	227	22.7
4	HF Cubs	CZ	29	19	20	19	31	17	17	18	16	21	207	20.7
5	HF Chicks	CZ	29	19	19	20	29	17	15	15	16	20	199	19.9
6	Skydive University Slovakia	SK	24	17	20	19	27	15	16	16	16	18	188	18.8
7	Blackjack	FI	28	13	19	19	29	15	16	16	15	16	186	18.6
8	Tempo	FI	23	17	21	19	26	15	15	17	14	17	184	18.4
9	Telakka	FI	24	17	19	18	24	13	16	16	14	16	177	17.7
10	Sky....	CZ	20	14	18	18	29	15	14	15	14	15	172	17.2
11	Silver Knights	FI	18	13	16	17	24	15	14	14	13	16	160	16.0
12	M Team	CZ	19	11	14	13	21	10	10	14	11	14	137	13.7
13	Accord	CZ	16	11	13	15	21	11	9	12	7	13	128	12.8

HF Cubs and HF Chicks at the World Tunnel League's January meet at the Hurricane Factory

Both all-female teams were first naturally separated between 2015 and 2018, as the HF Cubs juniors started their 4-way career in the A Class before moving up into AA in 2016. The separation was over in November 2018 when the HF Cubs competed for the first time in the AAA Class. The 4-way juniors won.

The HF Cubs are still eligible for the 4-way Junior competition at FAI/IPC world meets and world cups, and they don’t have to compete in the AAA Class. However, coach Jan Klapka and the team agree that they want to get ready for meets with the whole dive pool as soon as possible.

The HF Cubs still competed in their FAI/IPC category at the Czech Open Indoor Championship this month for a different reason. Team member Viktorie Nováková fell ill before the meet, and her team mates had HF Dragonflies junior Nela Kadecková in their lineup, who is only familiar with the AA Class dive pool.

In fact, the Dragonflies had just moved up from the Rookie Class to AA, as the NSL News reported on 19 December 2018. Nela Kadecková had three meets of AA Class experiences between November 2018 and January 2019 before filling the slot for the HF Cubs.

World Tunnel League January 2019		1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	Q,E,F,18	3,9,11	D,K,21,16	14,G,M,17	O,L,B,7	5,15,6	P,A,12,20	C,13,1	10,8,N	22,J,H,4	Total	Avg
3	HF Cubs	29	19	20	19	31	17	17	18	16	21	207	20.7
4	HF Chicks	29	19	19	20	29	17	15	15	16	20	199	19.9
World Tunnel League December 2018		1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	3,B,5	15,J,7	9,16,18	17,C,H,M	14,Q,11	L,6,21	A,P,F,20	K,D,22,13	1,4,12	19,O,8	Total	Avg
2	HF Cubs	22	26	20	33	19	22	29	21	17	18	227	22.7
3	HF Chicks	22	24	19	25	19	19	29	15	14	19	205	20.5
World Tunnel League November 2018		1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	H,16,P,21	11,D,7	N,18,9	K,C,B,Q,3	G,15,14	17,A,F,6	J,O,12,19	8,4,22	2,13,10	20,5,1	Total	Avg
2	HF Cubs	22	22	24	25	21	24	18	17	14	16	203	20.3
3	HF Chicks	21	20	24	23	17	22	17	16	15	13	188	18.8

The November meet of the Czech World Tunnel League was still not the first time that HF Chicks and HF Cubs competed against each other. Both teams have contributed to the Czech Indoor Cloud League account many times in the past years, even though they did not always win their categories against other Czech teams. They could at least compare their scores regularly.

The HF Cubs juniors and HF Chicks seniors have been on the same AAA Class leaderboards three times since the Cubs entered the AAA Class world, and the juniors won each time.

The situation is even more interesting, as one of the former HF Cubs, Tereza Zívalová, has been training and competing with the senior team for a while. She was still in the Cubs lineup that won the bronze medals at the FAI Indoor World Cup 2018 with a 27.3 average.

The fact that the HF Cubs have recently been the stronger female AAA Class team in the Czech Republic brings up a more rhetorical question: Who will compete for the Czech Republic in 4-way Women at the FAI Indoor World Meet 2019? It also raises a question that the NSL News brought up earlier: Could the HF Cubs compete in 4-way Junior and 4-way Women both? FAI/IPC has been allowing Formation Skydiving competitors to compete in different categories (4-way Open/4-way VFS and 4-way Open/8-way Open) at outdoor events...