posted Sep 8th, 2009 - The NSL News has not offered the conclusion of the Fun Flag story at the FAI World Cup 2009 yet.

The video of the wild battle for the flag after French videographer Sylvain Girault had dropped it from his parachute was posted with the story on 3 September 2009. This was the last Fun Flag update before the NSL News left Prostejov.

There were already rumors by then that France was not in possession of the flag any longer after winning it on the battlefield in the landing area. These rumors connected the UK delegation once again with the flag, although there was no conformation from UK teams and competitors and no evidence.

Hard evidence now came from Belgium. Hayabusa Defence member David Grauwels e-mailed photos to the NSL News that were taken by team videographer Danny Jacobs during the award ceremony in Prostejov.

It is obvious that the Fun Flag story of the World Cup 2009 came to a happy end. The flag was flying at the right time and at the right place, congratulations to Hayabusa Defence.

It must have been a strange feeling for the French World Cup winners of Aerodyne Cypres Maubeuge who received the gold medals in Prostejov, while Hayabusa Defence had the Fun Flag in their hands, right next to them. France had possession of the flag for most of the time and was not able to defend it and have it at the most important time.

France had already positive experiences with the Fun Flag, as the Deep Blue members took successfully possession of the flag at the World Cup 2007 in Russia and brought it home to France safely. Then they let it fly in Maubeuge at the Word Meet 2008 and lost it there. Bodyflight Storm won the gold medals and the Fun Flag.

The French delegation, who won all three sets of gold medals in the Formation Skydiving events, may have to evaluate how to take better care of the actual and most important part of the competition...

It was not a big surprise that Hayabusa Defence turned out as the winner of the competition. Coach and alternate, former Center Inside Luc Verstrepen, was already involved with the Fun Flag earlier in Prostejov and was apparently assigned by Hayabusa Defence to this important task. His military experiences in the Belgian army may have given him an advantage in coming up with a working strategy.

In addition, three of the Hayabusa members (David Grauwels, Andy Grauwels, Roy Janssen) already have broad experiences with the Fun Flag business. They were involved with the flag at the World Meet 2006 in Germany and left the competition site by then with the flag in their bag.

The NSL News will hopefully follow up soon with more details of the Fun Flag story. It is not known yet how the Fun Flag ended up in Hayabusa possession at the award ceremony.