posted Oct 9th, 2021 - The first preview of the Shamrock Showdown 2021 explained in June 2020 that the event will again be a starting point for the new world meet season. It was the time after the FAI Tanay Mondial 2020 was canceled and rescheduled for August 2021, and the annual Shamrock Showdown had fallen victim to the corona virus crisis, as well.

Both events still suffered heavily just a year later. Travel restrictions and other implications kept the participation at the world meet on the lowest level in the history of Formation Skydiving competition since 1985, and the Shamrock Showdown did not do much better five months before Round 1 of the world meet.

It was pure coincidence that both events were also impacted by bad weather, on top of the pandemic. The 4-way and 8-way teams at Skydive City completed only four rounds in March, and the world meet in August was over after six rounds in 4-way and seven rounds in 8-way.

The National Skydiving League, host of the Shamrock Showdown together with Skydive City, tried to make the best out of the situation and continued the event with the "Shamrock Showdown Cloud" that allowed interested teams to get on the same leaderboard by uploading their own videos of the ten Shamrock rounds.

---

Shamrock Showdown Cloud 2021			1		2		3		4		5		6		7		8		9		10		Total	Avg
Rank	8-way Open		1,J,3		Q,K,D,H,L		F,B,C,22		18,E,21		M,5,10		4,G,2		15,8,11		16,19,O		7,P,14		9,12,20		Total	Avg
1	France	FR	30	-2	25		28		19		18		23		20		22		17	-2	18	-1	220	22.0
2	Qatar Falcons	QA	23	-3	19	-2	21	-1	15		17		18	-1	15	-3	19		17		17		181	18.1
3	Tanay 8	RU	29	-2	26		25		16	-2	-		-		-		-		-		-		96	24.0
4	Airspeed XP8	US	28	-2	23	-3	24	-1	19		-		-		-		-		-		-		94	23.5
5	Prisoners 9	US	14	-1	13	-1	14	-1	9		-		-		-		-		-		-		50	12.5
6	Sandbaggers	US	8		5		7		-		-		-		-		-		-		-		20	6.7

---

France - Airspeed XP8 - Tanay 8 - Qatar Falcons at the Shamrock Showdown 2021

---

It was the same concept that the National Skydiving League had applied for the NSL Cloud Mondial 2020. Goal was to offer the teams at least some kind of an opportunity to measure themselves with the help of other results when live events were realistically not possible.

Both leaderboards of the NSL online events were not as large compared to live events in the past, while they still featured world-class teams and performances. It turned out to be a reasonable substitute solution to apply the NSL Network format of the last two decades for the compromised conditions of the pandemic.

At least the 8-way competition of the Shamrock Showdown Cloud 2021 brought together all four medal contenders on the same leaderboard and became a serious test in the run-up to the FAI Tanay Mondial 2020.

However, the NSL News made it clear on April 15th this year that online/virtual/cloud events would only be emergency measures. The NSL Network will continue with the same format that has been applied in the last two decades, which has always been based on live events at different locations.

---

FAI Tanay Mondial 2020			1		2		3		4		5		6		7		Total	Avg
Rank	8-way Open		O,19,Q,5		17,B,E,P		H,15,12		M,N,7,F		K,L,C,4		J,18,16		1,9,A		Total	Avg
1	Airspeed XP8	US	20		23		22	-1	23		31	-1	23		24		166	23.7
2	France National 8-way	FR	20		23		25		24		26	-1	25	-1	22	-1	165	23.6
3	Tanay 8	RU	18		21	-1	20		23		26		23		22		153	21.9
4	Qatar Falcons	QA	17		17		19		18		22		19	-1	19		131	18.7
5	Kazakhstan	KZ	5		9		6	-2	10		7	-1	12	-1	12		61	8.7
6	Belarus	BY	4	-1	6		4	-2	5	-2	7		8	-1	2	-1	36	5.1

---

Airspeed XP8 - France - Tanay 8 - Qatar Falcons at the FAI Tanay Mondial 2020

---

Even the larger signature events of the NSL Network, such as NSL Championships and Shamrock Showdown, have been live events since the NSL was launched in 1998, just as FAI world meets, world cups and national championships in all countries.

The Shamrock Showdown was always a live event, and this year's online continuation as a part of the event will not become the default. The pandemic with its implications, including travel restrictions, seems to come to its end soon with the desired herd immunity, and the perspectives for a return to a Shamrock Showdown of the earlier years are promising.

Skydive City and National Skydiving League decided to follow up with the same hosting partnership as in the past two years, especially after several international teams confirmed plans to travel to Florida for outdoor training in the coming spring.

The Shamrock Showdown 2022 will be once again the starting point of the national teams for the 2022 road to the next outdoor world meet in October at Skydive Arizona. As usual at the Shamrock Showdown, all other teams have the opportunity to be live on the same competition site where the best teams in the world do their 4-way and 8-way business.