posted Jul 19th, 2024 - The NSL News reported on June 20th that the ESL Championship of the European Skydiving League will have a comeback this year. The last ESL Championship was held before the pandemic in 2019, and the skydiving center in Spa hosted the event.

The mentioned update pointed out that the Fallschirmsportzentrum (FSZ) Saar was the competition site of the previous ESL Championship in 2018, and Mike Pennock is hosting this year's event once again in Saarlouis. It is the same place where the dramatic 8-way battle between Airbus 8-way and Operation Adler took place last year at the German national outdoor championship.

The ESL Championship 2019 in Spa was also the starting point for the two new teams from Qatar, who have been guided by coaches Gary Smith and Luc Verstrepen ever since, Cheetahs and Lions. The team project had the goal to create a more solid foundation for the two national teams in 4-way (Tigers) and 8-way (Falcons) for the time when new competitors would be needed. Cheetahs and Lions competed in the A Class in 2019 and placed 1st and 3rd on the ESL leaderboard for this category. They followed up with a few meets in the AA Class before Gary Smith and Luc Vertrepen trained them for the complete FAI/ISC dive pool in the AAA Class.

ESL Championship 2019			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	Total	Avg
Rank	A Class		F,E,A	J,4	M,8	2,9	Q,6	21,N	L,P,7	19,O	Total	Avg
1	Lions	QA	13	7	11	7	11	9	11	10	79	9.9
2	Falcons	QA	18	9	11	8	9	9	8	6	78	9.8
3	Cheetahs	QA	17	7	7	9	8	8	11	10	77	9.6
4	Hight Five	CZ	13	6	11	7	9	8	12	10	76	9.5
5	British Army Volt4ge	UK	19	9	7	7	7	7	9	6	71	8.9
6	High Voltage	BE	12	10	8	9	8	8	8	6	69	8.6
6	Funky Falcon	NL	12	7	11	8	8	7	8	8	69	8.6
8	Huayra	BE	12	8	8	7	8	7	6	9	65	8.1
9	Black Devils	BE	11	7	4	7	6	3	7	8	53	6.6
10	Oljakoda	BE	9	4	5	3	6	5	5	6	43	5.4

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Qatar Lions at the ESL Championship 2019 - ESL Championship Invitation

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The lineups of Lions and Cheetahs have changed a few times since 2019, and the current ones are well known in the top level of 4-way Formation Skydiving competition by now, even though the two national teams, Tigers and Falcons, are still competing at the FAI/ISC events for their country.

However, Lions and Cheetahs collect their own international competition experiences at other events. Both teams competed next to the Tigers and the Falcons at the FAI Outdoor World Cup 2023. They attended three indoor competitions this year alone, and they have an outdoor meet schedule that begins very soon.

The NSL News recently covered the exciting 4-way battle at the CISM World Championship with a few updates. The Qatar Tigers competed for their country in Hungary, where only one 4-way team represents each country. The situation is the same at FAI world championships, and the Qatar Tigers will soon try to defend their bronze medal position of 2022, the Qatar Falcons their 8-way silver medals. Once again, Lions and Cheetahs have to look for their own meet opportunities. They attended the combined BENELUX Championship 2023 as guest teams after competing in Norway a few weeks earlier. Now they have similar plans for the coming months.

BENELUX Championship 2023			1		2		3		4		5		6		7		8		9		10		Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class		3,E,B,18		21,A,P,13		O,22,Q,1		9,D,10		16,M,17		J,14,4		12,H,N,15		8,G,6		19,K,C,5		F,20,2		Total	Avg
1	Out Of The Blue	NL	18		20		15	-3	19		18		16		16	-1	16		20		19		177	17.7
2	Qatar Lions	QA	16	-2	18	-1	18		19	-1	21		16	-1	13	-2	16		18	-2	18	-1	173	17.3
3	Qatar Cheetahs	QA	16	-2	17	-1	17		17	-1	18	-1	17		14	-1	16		18		16	-2	166	16.6
4	Chaotic Motion VIXX	NL	17		17		17		16	-1	17		14		15		16		18		17	-1	164	16.4
5	AYRO	BE	17	-1	19		14	-1	18		16		15		16		15	-1	14	-1	16	-1	160	16.0
6	Falco	BE	15	-1	18		16		17		18		14		14		14		15	-2	18		159	15.9
7	Family Flash	BE	13		14		14		13		14		12		11	-1	12		14	-1	13	-1	130	13.0
8	LUX	NL	11		14		13		14		13		12		12		12		13		14		128	12.8
9	Phoenix	BE	12		15		13		13		10		10		12		14		13		9		121	12.1
10	Full Flow	BE	12		13		12		11		13		11		12		11		12		12		119	11.9
11	Aquila	NL	8		12		8		10		11		11		9		11		9		12		101	10.1
12	Shinobi	NL	8		11		8		9		10		8		7		9		7		11		88	8.8

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Lions and Cheetahs at the BENELUX Championship 2023

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Coaches Gary Smith and Luc Verstrepen have registered Lions and Cheetahs for two more international events in Europe, and they will launch their competition travel at this year's BENELUX Championship, the combination of Belgium's, Netherlands' and Luxembourg's national outdoor championships at the beginning of September.

Then the Qatar 4-way delegation has two weeks before Lions and Cheetahs compete again, this time at the ESL Championship 2024 in Saarlouis. Both teams are familiar with the BENELUX Championship, where they will meet teams again that they shared the leaderboard with in 2023.

However, Lions and Cheetahs both have not visited the Fallschirmsportzentrum Saar in Germany yet, host of this year's ESL Championship. The Qatar Falcons won the 8-way competition as a guest team at Germany's national championship there last year, while the Qatar 4-way teams were in Belgium. Lions and Cheetahs return to the ESL Championship in the AAA Class with their current and very well trained lineups. They can probably not win the ESL Spirit award for the strongest nation. However, they will be top contenders for the medal rankings of the AAA Class competition in Saarlouis.