posted Jul 13th, 2024 - A slower meet weekend, with only the Virginia Parachute Council celebrating a comeback that Kat Osipova has organized for the teams in her region, the NSL News has another opportunity to add information to the archives that has not been published yet at SKYLEAGUE.COM or anywhere else.

However, the NSL News reported in October 1999 how Silvanus (Solly) Williams covered the FAI World Championship 1999 for the internet presence that the NSL News had at that time. He was coaching the DeLand Norgies to their first bronze medals in Australia before he eventually also became their opponent with DeLand Majik a few years later. He had already won his own FAI bronze medal for South Africa (DeLand Equanimity) at the world championship in Turkey 1997 and followed up with U.S. gold in Rijeka 2004. The NSL News introduced Solly Williams' updates from Australia on 21 October 1999:

The first day of the world championships in Formation Skydiving is almost over by the time this news update is posted. Australia is half a day ahead of U.S. time, and the first scores will be on the leaderboards by now. The scores can be found at the Omniskore website. The link on the world meet logo on the front page leads straight to the competition pages of Omniskore webmaster Tim Wagner. Also on site in Australia is Solly Williams. He is coaching the Norgies to the 3rd place in 4-way. This way, the bronze medal may at least stay within Solly's family.

Solly Williams won bronze medals at the last world meet in 1997 with the South African national team. The interesting aspect is the fact that his team mate and fellow coach at Skydive DeLand, Gary Smith, has the same goal, but with a different team. Gary Smith is coaching the British national 4-way team, Sebastian XL. Pete Allum and his team will be the Norgies' biggest competition besides the Russian 4-way team. Solly Williams was so kind to provide the NSL News readers with some insider and background information. Thanks, Solly, NSL News and audience appreciate your insights. The updates are very exciting and promise a great meet. Here are Solly's first impressions:

FAI World Championship 1999			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	4-way Open Top 7		9,24,A	O,M,2,Q	14,P,11	19,3,15	N,8,12	C,1,E,20	K,23,17	B,16,21	L,22,J,7	G,5,6	Total	Avg
1	Maubeuge	FR	23	23	18	19	18	24	21	21	21	20	208	20.8
2	Arizona Airspeed	US	23	24	19	16	17	26	19	19	20	19	202	20.2
3	DeLand Norgies	NO	21	23	16	17	16	23	20	19	20	16	191	19.1
4	Sebastian XL	UK	21	23	16	17	17	23	18	17	20	18	190	19.0
5	Russia	RU	22	20	13	16	16	17	18	17	18	15	172	17.2
6	Australia	AU	20	21	15	15	14	19	17	17	15	16	169	16.9
7	Daedalus	DE	18	18	13	13	14	18	15	14	16	16	155	15.5

Solly Williams for the NSL News from Australia on 21 October 1999

We are an hour out from the draw. There are 25 teams in 4-way Open and 15 in 8-way, only four in 4-way Women, unfortunately. The Russian girls as well as the Brazilian girls canceled at the last minute due to financial issues. The venue is great. Pretty tropical which isn't what we were expecting. I guess it gets real dry here at the end of the year though. This is the time when they host their nationals and Christmas boogie. Facilities are good and there is little to complain about except one major factor. The Twin Otters they are using in the meet have no doors on them. And it's been down to -25' Celsius at jump altitude. That's cold. There is still a lot of discussion on this subject which is yet to be resolved.

Over the last two days this dz has transformed itself into a venue with world meet atmosphere. The Aussies in general are very friendly and hospitable, too. The are a few late arrivals still in bound. The Russian 4-way team only got here a few hours ago which is going to be pretty hard on them. The Brazilian delegation is absent due to some funding mixup.

My primary coaching responsibility here is with the Norwegians. But I have been helping some other teams that I've been coaching through the year. The Norgies completed their last training jump today in style. They scored the same as Sebastian XL on the same jump, which is pretty much going to be the trend of the meet. Both teams expect to go head to head round for round. Mental toughness will be the only give. In my opinion it's between these two teams for the bronze.

I haven't watched too much French 4-way. But what I did see looked fast and maybe slightly erratic. Having said that, they did score a wonderful 26 in the training jump (1-J-M-21). Airspeed also came up with 26 on a slightly quicker jump (F-2-P-Q). Both looked comfortable. Rumor has it that the French scored 41 for Round 6 of the U.S. Nationals 1999 which included a melt down after 32 seconds. I can believe it as they are cruising.

The biggest boost for me here so far has been watching the Russian 8-way. This team is ripping, and I mean ripping. Some of the fastest, if not the fastest 8-way I have ever seen. It looks like 4-way most of the time. Jumps we have watched them do so far have yielded scores like 26, 30, 23, 27, 25. If these guys can keep it together, it's going to be a good-bye for Arizona Airspeed's planned double-victory. Two totally different styles. The Russians are living by the sword in their approach for the sword. But as we all know, that kind of style can also die by the sword. The French 8-way has also traveled a long road to where they are. They are doing some spectacular stuff out the door like keying a cat in just over two seconds. Pretty impressive overall, and they have let me know that they are here to win. Might be a little out of reach though.

Who is my money on? I've always liked the static start-and-stop approach to formation skydiving. Both the French 4-way and the Russian 8-way play with carrying momentum. I'll stick with Airspeed for the double. But believe me, I wouldn't put a lot of money on it... Meet starts off with 8-way tomorrow and then 4-way the next day. Yahoo.

FAI World Championship 1999			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	8-way Open Top 6		15,7,13	B,12,E,3	20,K,11	23,H,J	F,2,8	D,6,P,22	N,A,M,G,16	21,L,14	10,C,4	1,9,O	Total	Avg
1	Arizona Airspeed	US	22	25	20	20	16	22	25	19	21	21	211	21.1
2	Russia	RU	20	23	20	23	14	19	26	19	22	23	209	20.9
3	Maubeuge	FR	15	21	22	23	13	21	26	19	20	20	200	20.0
4	Australia	AU	15	18	12	10	12	16	20	14	14	16	147	14.7
5	Japan	JP	12	12	11	11	11	12	14	13	10	13	119	11.9
6	Germany	DE	13	13	12	12	9	10	15	10	11	10	115	11.5

Solly Williams for the NSL News from Australia on 22 October 1999

It's still a long way to go. After three rounds in 8-way and two rounds in 4-way, Arizona Airspeed is in 1st place in both events and on the way to make history. No team ever in history of Formation Skydiving competition has won both events. But Airspeed isn't there yet. Russia in 8-way and France in 4-way are right there. As expected, the Norgies and Sebastian XL are racing for the bronze medals in 4-way. Both teams are closer to Airspeed and France than most people expected. 1st and 4th place are separated by only three points. And even the Russian 4-way team on 5th place is scoring on the same level. Here is Solly's analysis of the first day of the competition:

"Day 1 of the meet has come and gone! The opening ceremony was quite casual, although filled with entertainment keeping it fun. The meet got under way at 12.30 pm and commenced with 8-way and 4-way Women. All the female teams are very close after two rounds. The Swedes had a poor first-round exit that cost them a couple of points. The Australian girls who have made 400 jumps this year are looking great. At the moment the placings fit the statistics of training jumps done this year: Australia (400 team jumps), Sweden (250 team jumps), England (150 team jumps), New Zealand (less then 100 team jumps). Woman's 4-way continues today and should be a close one to the end.

The Russian 8-way skydived hard and won every round on speed. They where always closer to the next point then Airspeed. The problem is that they are not judge-friendly in terms of being easy to judge. Their jumpsuit colors are white, and their video is not the greatest. They had penalties once per round and trail Airspeed by four points after three jumps. France also had had a poor start to the 8-way aspirations when they picked up a triple bust in Round 1 and another one in Round 2. They would be tying first place if they could contain the busts. Having said that, the day belonged to Airspeed who kept a clean slate and kept the Russians frustrated. Airspeed where caught with some slower engineering in Round 3 and were outscored both by Russia and France by two. We should still see a very interesting meet here, especially if the Russians can apply some pressure early tomorrow. 8-way is off for the day."

Women Cup 1999			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	4-way Women		9,24,A	O,M,2,Q	14,P,11	19,3,15	N,8,12	C,1,E,20	K,23,17	B,16,21	L,22,J,7	G,5,6	Total	Avg
1	V-Max	UK	13	15	10	8	9	12	11	12	13	11	114	11.4
2	Australia	AU	15	15	9	11	7	15	10	10	13	8	113	11.3
3	4 Pleasure	SE	13	16	11	5	12	9	9	12	13	10	110	11.0
4	New Zealand	NZ	8	10	6	6	6	6	5	4	8	7	66	6.6