posted Dec 29th, 2010 - The situation between the USA and France in the Open Class competition at the Dubai Championship 2011 will be the opposite compared to the female 4-way category.

France is coming back with the original lineup of the reigning Aerokart Deep Blue 4-way world champions in the female 4-way category, while USA has a half-way new team in Dubai as the NSL News recently reported.

In the Open Class, Arizona Airspeed competes in Dubai with the same lineup that won the silver medals at the World Championship of Formation Skydiving 2010, while France attends the first meet with the new member, Emmanuel "Manu" Sarrazin.

The NSL News has followed the battles between this Airspeed lineup and the Aerodyne Cypres Maubeuge 4-way lineup of the past four years meet by meet and year by year. The final showdown at the World Meet in Menzelinsk concluded the 4-year drama - but only almost...

There is still one more battle ahead, the Dubai Championship in January 2011, although this new duel includes one new player between those two lineups.

This is also not really true, as Manu Sarrazin has actually competed four times directly with Airspeed. All four meets were the World Challenge indoor competitions of the last four years at Bodyflight Bedford.

World Challenge 2010		Round1	Round2	Round3	Round4	Round5	Round6	Round7	Round8	Round9	Round10	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	5,4,12	J,M,E,D,L	20,17,8	15,18,7	22,A,F,K	21,C,G,6	9,19,16	B,13,14	H,P,O,3	N,2,10	Total	Avg
5	USA Arizona Airspeed	23	55	23	25	30	29	26	27	36	22	296	29.6
6	France Aerokart PCs	20	62	22	24	30	25	27	26	36	22	294	29.4

Manu Sarrazin was only an observer from the distance the first three times on the scoreboard. Airspeed was too far ahead, and Manu Sarrazin was actually a French 8-way expert who was also in charge of bringing the French B-Team members up to speed.

This worked out very well for the French 4-way fan, as the situation was very different at the World Challenge 2010. Aerokart PCs gave Airspeed a very direct race throughout the whole 10-round meet. Manu Sarrazin's 4th direct competition with Airspeed this year was decided by only two points.

The new NSL-TV video features this indoor 4-way battle between the 4-way world champions of 2008 and the two French 8-way experts (Clement Martin-Saint-Leon, Manu Sarrazin) with their former "B-Team students" (Arnaud Mille, Julien Olek).

The Dubai Championship 2011 brings all the top players back together. Airspeed competes one more time with the lineup of 2007 - 2010 before Mark Kirkby, Thomas Hughes, Josh Hall, Niklas Hemlin and Dave Brown (Camera) will take it from here.

Aerodyne Cypres Maubeuge brings the new lineup with three reigning 4-way world champions (Mathieu and Guillaume Bernier, Julien Degen) and Manu Sarrazin to Dubai. The new French lineup will not have much training together when the meet begins in little over a week.

Airspeed has not trained much at all with this lineup after Round 10 at the World Meet in Menzelinsk. NMP-PCH Hayabusa's new lineup with Dennis Praet is probably best prepared of all top teams and has already posted a 32.9 indoor average in November. Maybe it's the right time for the Belgian team to impress the 4-way world...

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