posted Jan 4th, 2024 - The national teams of the United States in horizontal Formation Skydiving competition do not only have a clean participation sheet at world championships since 1985, as the NSL News pointed out with the update on December 28th. The U.S. 8-way teams have dominated the biannual leaderboards even more than the 4-way teams.

In fact, only the U.S. delegation had 8-way teams at each of the 20 FAI/ISC events between 1985 and 2022. On top of that, the country's 8-way teams have won medals at each of these 20 world championships, 15 sets of gold medals, five in silver. The 2nd place was the lowest position on a world championship leaderboard.

The Coors 8-way team from California launched the series of 8-way gold and silver medals in 1985 before the Golden Knights took over the 8-way dominance in the United States and won a total of ten sets of gold medals without ever placing second. The U.S. Army professionals of the Golden Knights and Arizona Airspeed's 8-way teams together won 17 of the other 19 sets of FAI 8-way medals, including a streak of eight consecutive 1st places between 1985 and 1999. Arizona Airspeed lineups won two 8-way world championship titles in 1999 and 2004. Variations of Paraclete XP lineups (AZXP8, XP8) added the remaining two 8-way titles in 2021 and 2022.

Participation of all 8-way Open Class national teams since 1985

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Only two other nations outscored the U.S. 8-way teams at world championship since 1985, Russia twice in 2001 and 2003, France three consecutive times between 2006 and 2010. The current U.S. combination of XP8 members and Golden Knights (GKXP8) can most likely not be caught by any other 8-way team in the world and will add the 16th world championship title to the U.S. collection.

France has missed a world championship in 8-way only once in Australia 2018, where the Golden Knights 8-way team won their last title for the U.S. Army before Paraclete XP8 took over as the national 8-way team. As the U.S. teams did, French 8-way teams won sets of FAI medals at each world championship between 1985 and 2016, before not even sending an 8-way team to Australia at all.

National coach Mathieu Bernier came back with a plan for vengeance and almost took the top of the 8-way leaderboard again at the FAI Tanay Mondial in August 2021. His 8-way combination of the two French national teams in 4-way Open and 4-way Women had a 1-point lead over Airspeed XP8 after Round 6. The U.S. team turned it into their own 1-point advantage in Round 7, which was the end of the 8-way competition in Russia due to bad weather. The next French national 8-way team, with a lineup of recreational competitors and player-coach Manu Sarrazin, finished out of the medal positions in Eloy 2022.

8-way Open Class medal winners at world championships since 1985

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Russian 8-way teams attended all world championships since 1985, except the one in Maubeuge 2008, where Italy's eX3mo 8-way lineup were glad to fill in on the 8-way podium. Russia was back in 8-way medal positions between 2010 and 2021 and before the country was banned from participation at FAI/ISC events.

The Qatar Falcons were the only 8-way team next to the United States who attended all four world championships between 2016 and 2022. They won the first set of FAI medals in the history of the country's Formation Skydiving participation with bronze in Australia 2018, and in the absence of France.

The Falcons turned bronze into silver in Eloy 2022, where Russia could not defend their medal positions of 2018 and 2021. Russian 8-way teams have won FAI medals at 17 of the 18 world championships that they attended. Germany benefited from the absence of a Russian 8-way team and won the country's first FAI world championship medals in Eloy 2022. Germany may have a chance to copy the same finish at the 26th FAI World Formation Skydiving Championships in North Carolina this year. 8-way participation at world championships has not recovered from the corona virus crisis as well as 4-way competition has. The five teams in Eloy 2022 tied the record low of Menzelinsk 2010. Australia and Canada are next on the participation chart, who could bring back 8-way teams to the event.

8-way Open Class participation at outdoor world championships since 1985

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