posted Sep 15th, 2019 - The NSL News has transitioned to Raeford, where the Formation Skydiving competition of the USPA Nationals begins on Monday with Round 1 in the 4-way events at Skydive Paraclete XP.

Some teams were still using the Paraclete XP wind tunnel and its 16-foot flying chamber for the final preparations, and a visit there is only a 15-minute drive from the dropzone. It was not only team training that took place at Paraclete XP. In fact, the September event of Paraclete XP's Indoor Cloud League team was scheduled for Friday evening before the USPA Nationals, and Morgan Womble was organizing once again a group of high-profile coaches and participants.

Saturday at competition site of the USPA Nationals included a surprise. The Russian 8-way team from Tanay was in training and turns the 8-way competition into an international event, as well. NMP PCH HayaBusa does the same in 4-way and had a day off on Saturday.

The 8-way competition of the USPA Nationals is now not only the showdown between Golden Knights and Paraclete XP8 for the world meet qualification. The host of next year's event in Tanay, 8-way team member Andrey Barabash, is at the USPA competition site in Raeford and will soon find out who will compete for the United States. The 8-way competition begins on Wednesday.

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The Russian 8-way team added a few more jumps to their training account this year. Craig Girard said that he counted over 700 training jumps so far, and the Tanay team will be well prepared for the competition in Raeford.

The Russians will be just as well prepared for the FAI Outdoor World Cup 2019 in October, as well. Craig Girard said that the team is planning to stay in the United States until after the world cup. They will travel to Arizona after the USPA Nationals and train in Eloy until the start of the next 8-way competition.

The team has a highly experienced lineup of 8-way world champions around Mondial 2020 host Andrey Barabash, even with another world champion on the bench as the alternate, Alexey Minaev. Craig Girard said that the average age of the team members is 45 years, with a wealth of 8-way experiences.

Tanay coach Craig Girard himself will try to challenge the Russian 8-way team and has put together a very strong Airspeed 8-way lineup, as well. The 8-way competition at this year's USPA Nationals will probably be the best one in the history of the event. However, the 4-way competition will be first, and Round 1 is scheduled for tomorrow morning.

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USPA Nationals 2018			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	8-way Open		8,B,6	P,3,C,M	1,18,Q	22,E,16	11,17,H	L,12,13	7,A,20	19,14,9	J,5,4	G,15,10	Total	Avg
1	XP8	US	17	20	19	17	14	13	17	14	21	17	169	16.9
2	Arizona Airspeedish	US	13	22	19	18	15	15	15	13	16	19	165	16.5
3	Qatar Falcons	QA	16	21	18	14	15	15	16	13	17	16	161	16.1
4	Amphibious Attack Tigers	US	12	14	13	14	10	9	10	9	14	13	118	11.8
5	French Monsters	US	10	9	10	10	9	10	5	10	10	11	94	9.4
6	Blocksmiths XP	US	10	10	10	6	6	6	8	7	10	7	80	8.0

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