posted Sep 16th, 2021 - The French system of selecting the country's national teams in Formation Skydiving competition has been very successful for decades and has created one of the world's powerhouses in 4-way and 8-way competition. The national coach and assistants are forming farm teams where potential top performers train and compete to get ready for a future slot in the national teams.

The current members of the French national teams have all gone through their time in the B-teams and almost accomplished the "Mission Impossible", with two sets of FAI gold medals at the same world meet with the same team members, which national coach Mathieu Bernier was aiming at.

Qatar is a relatively new top player in the Formation Skydiving world and has collected the first FAI medals quickly, first with the 8-way team (Falcons) in Australia 2018, followed recently by the 4-way Open Class team (Tigers) at the FAI Tanay Mondial 2020.

Qatar's engagement in Formation Skydiving competition began with a lot of professional full-time training for the selected team members in the 4-way and 8-way lineups. The teams hired highly experienced world-class coaches (Solly Williams, Marco Arrigo, Gary Smith, Jeremie Rollett), who could use the unlimited resources to push the teams to the world's top level in the respective events.

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Belgian Outdoor Nationals 2021			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	AA Class		22,19	D,20,C	K,E,F,G	21,18	M,4,J	15,H,1	O,N,P,Q	6,B,11	A,2,9	14,8	Total	Avg
1	Cheetahs	QA	13	18	25	14	22	17	31	17	20	11	188	18.8
2	Lions	QA	15	17	25	13	17	16	25	15	18	13	174	17.4
3	High Voltage	BE	7	7	17	7	12	9	18	10	9	9	105	10.5

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Qatar's Formation Skydiving delegation had to go through a few personnel changes, despite the professional commitment of the team members, and the coaches did not have many choices for any open slots. The Qatar management eventually decided to put more efforts into creating a backup system that is somehow similar to the French team selection.

They assigned new Formation Skydiving competitors, coming from the same military police community, to create two additional 4-way teams, the Cheetahs and the Lions. Once again, highly experienced coaches, Luc Verstrepen and Marin Ferre, both former world-class competitors, began working with the teams as soon as the selection of the team members was completed.

Frenchman Marin Ferre used to work within the French selection system as one of the assistant national coaches, and he could use his wealth of coaching experiences for the new job. Luc Verstrepen is a former NMP PCH HayaBusa member and has been coaching many teams after stepping back from the active competition career.

Luc Verstrepen with the Cheetahs and Marin Ferre with the Lions recently meet each other at the Belgian Outdoor Nationals, which was no coincidence, of course. The summer in central Europe offers many national championship events that the Qatar teams could use to collect competition experiences.

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German Outdoor Nationals 2021			1		2		3		4		5		6		7		8		9		10		Total	Avg
Rank	AA Class		15,8		18,Q,9		K,21,22		13,14		7,1		4,19		2,M,20		N,D,H,A		L,E,11		6,B,O		Total	Avg
1	Cheetahs	QA	14		19		16		14		16		11		15		17		17		22		161	16.1
2	Shark Meido	DE	6		9		7		6		9		8		9		13		10		11		88	8.8
2	Flying Cowboys	DE	7		10		9		7		9		4		9		15		6		12		88	8.8
4	Fr4ggles	DE	5		10		7		7		9		5		10		14		10		9		86	8.6
5	Black Forest Four	DE	7		11		7		7		8		6		8		12		9		9		84	8.4

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Qatar Cheetahs at the German Outdoor Nationals 2021

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Cheetahs and Lions both were able to attend two 10-round meets within ten days, and it was a perfect fit for the coaches, too. The 4-way journey started with training and the first competition in Belgium, very close to Luc Verstrepen's home turf, and not too far away from France and Germany.

Both teams continued in the AA Class, after they had started their 4-way team career in the A Class competition of the ESL Championship 2019 and moved up into the AA Class after that. They challenged each other only in Belgium, where the Cheetahs won, and then split their travel routes.

Luc Verstrepen was planning to help his German team Oceanside AtomiX defending the 4-way Open title that they had won together in 2019, and the Cheetahs followed him to Saarlouis. There they had no opposition on the AA Class leaderboard by any German teams and won again with a 16.1 average.

Marin Ferre traveled with the Lions to Pamiers in his own homeland, where the Lions took the top spot on the AA Class leaderboard with a 16.4 average. Marin Ferre could also watch his former 4-way students of the Aerokart Ak'demie junior team win the French outdoor bronze medals in the AAA Class. Without serious competition on any AA Class leaderboards, Cheetahs and Lions will probably soon post their first AAA Class scores.

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French Outdoor Nationals 2021			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	AA Class		N,H,6	18,8	Q,P,B,14	20,21	F,15,G	11,K,O	2,J,E	L,9,D	1,19	C,M,A,22	Total	Avg
1	Lions	QA	19	13	17	14	13	17	17	20	15	19	164	16.4
2	Tim ASPU Maubeuge	FR	7	5	5	6	6	6	9	6	7	9	66	6.6
3	Last Minute Pamiers	FR	4	3	6	5	5	6	4	8	5	1	47	4.7

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Qatar Lions at the French Outdoor Nationals 2021

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