posted Nov 5th, 2024 - Gary Smith is not only a 4-way world champion of 2004 (DeLand Majik) and 2006 (DeLand Fire), after his previous career with South African teams, including 1997 bronze medalists DeLand Equanimity.

He is probably better know now for his most successful coaching career, which brought NMP PCH HayaBusa to the top of the 4-way world, and guided Qatar Falcons and Qatar Tigers to the country's first FAI medals in Formation Skydiving competition. The NSL News also covered on October 25th how he currently gets a new generation of 4-way teams and competitors in Qatar ready for the near future, together with Luc Verstrepen.

There is still a third territory that Gary Smith has been engaged in consistently. He has never been shy of discussing his experiences as competitor and coach with the NSL News and of sharing his thoughts with the audience. He is well spoken due to his education at college and university where he studied commerce and law for five years at the University of Peitermaritzburg before he turned to a full-time skydiving career. His knowledge and experience in Formation Skydiving competition is probably unprecedented. He has attended all 17 world championships between 1991 and 2022, either as a competitor or as a coach, and the 26th FAI World Formation Skydiving Championships was the first one he missed since 1991.

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NSL Live Talk with Gary Smith on 5 November 2024

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His Qatar coaching partner Luc Verstrepen has often been available for NSL Live Talk, as well, especially when they travel together to work with the current Qatar 4-way delegation behind the Tigers, the Lions and Cheetahs. Gary Smith and Luc Verstrepen together discussed the upcoming world championship during a preview on September 26th, after they had attended the BENELUX Championship and the ESL Championship with their teams.

This time, the coaches were separated again, and only Gary Smith took the time for an aftermath evaluation of the competition at Crystal Coast Skydiving. He said that it has become easy to follow the actual competition action via internet technology, while there is no replacement for the social part and the exciting dynamics live at the competition site.

There were not a lot of surprises for an extremely experienced competitor and coach as Gary Smith, even though the complete FS Sweep was in jeopardy when the Norwegian 4-way VFS team challenged the U.S. team SDC Core until the very last round and lost by one single point. Gary Smith explained the level of dynamics between the audiences in Europe and United States when it came down to the last round in 4-way VFS to complete the FS Sweep or not.

FAI Outdoor World Championship 2024			1		2		3		4		5		6		7		8		9		10		Total	Avg
Rank	4-way Open		14,G,13		J,C,17,12		D,A,21,P		18,B,H,F		E,L,O,8		22,2,K		6,7,16		9,20,15		3,M,N,4		5,1,10		Total	Avg
1	Arizona Airspeed	US	24		27	-1	33		36		31		23		26		26		25		22	-1	273	27.3
2	Aethers	FR	22		23	-4	33		32	-1	29		23		22		21		25		22		252	25.2
3	Qatar Tigers	QA	21		20	-3	26	-2	32		29	-1	20		21		20		19	-2	20		228	22.8
4	NMP PCH HayaBusa	BE	19		21	-2	25		25		25	-1	20		19		17		21	-1	20		212	21.2

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4-way Open Top 4 at Crystal Coast 2024

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Gary Smith agreed that the situation after the world championship and in the next two years could become quite exciting when the two teams with unchanged lineups (French Aethers - Qatar Tigers) will most likely have a head-start over Arizona Airspeed and NMP PCH HayaBusa. He agreed that the French team became the top contender for the next two years as soon as Round 10 was completed in North Carolina.

The NSL News covered the same situation with yesterday's update, and Gary Smith's evaluation and foresight of the same time period provided the view of one of the most experienced competitors and coaches in the history of the sport.

Gary Smith also provided some insights of the situation in the country that is considered a new powerhouse in Formation Skydiving competition. The facilities of a new skydiving center in Doha, Qatar's capital city, are now available for the training of the country's teams and competitors, who have been traveling all across the planet for their training camps. Jeremie Rollett, 8-way coach of the Qatar Falcons, has already moved to Qatar with his family to simplify his own logistics. Gary Smith has no plans of moving from the island of Texel in the Netherlands to Qatar and will continue traveling a lot, together with his partner coach Luc Verstrepen. He confirmed that the travel plans include a visit in DeLand next year, where he lived and trained to win his two world championship gold medals in 2004 and 2006. Qatar Lions and Qatar Cheetahs both will compete at the Shamrock Showdown 2025 in April.