posted Jun 13th, 2011 - Last weekend saw 21 teams compete across the four categories at the June Meet of the United Kingdom Skydiving League (UKSL) in Langar. Many of the teams are already familiar to the NSL News audience after having competed at previous UKSL competitions. However, a number of local teams also joined in the competition and did rather well with a total of 4/10 podium places going to Langar based teams.

Teams began to arrive Friday night to get registered, erect tents and, in some cases, borrow suitable jumping footwear from other teams having forgotten to bring their own...

Competitors were greeted with blue skies and low winds on Saturday morning and jumping got swiftly underway making use of the two Grand Caravans set aside for competition use. Julia Foxwell (Satori) and Liz Matthews (Bodyflight) were kept busy helping all the teams with creeping and exit practice and the rounds were steadily completed.

There was a brief weather hold mid-afternoon as clouds moved in but this was then followed by wall-to-wall blue skies. Unfortunately the weather hold meant that it wasn’t possible to get the competition finished in a day. All teams ended Saturday having completed five out of the six rounds.

Saturday night saw the band Kaox playing a set in the bar and the stone-baked pizza van in the car park was popular judging by the queues. With only one round left to compete in the morning and a 10am start due to local restrictions there was a good atmosphere in the bar along with a lot of very questionable dance moves. Particular mention must go to the Enigma squad teams who decided that a game of Met Roulette was on the cards and were quickly knocking back jager-bombs on the assumption that bad weather would prevent jumping in the morning.

The weather predictions were proved right on Sunday morning when jumping was put on hold after only two loads. The clouds rolled in, the rain started and teams waited it out until 12pm when a decision was taken to call the competition on five rounds. The medals were presented (and then swapped as teams realised they’d been given the wrong colours), photos taken and cars packed up to allow competitors an early getaway. Thanks as always to all the staff at Langar for putting on a great meet and to the judges for the hard work they put in at every competition.

Rookie Class Competition

In the Rookie Class, three of the teams that had competed at the previous UKSL meet were joined by four new teams to create a well-balanced field. Early on it became clear that the race for the two top spots would be between RAFSPA Hurricane and Azure. After three rounds Hurricane had built up a 3-point lead. This lead was extended over the final two rounds and RAFSPA Hurricane took the top spot with 37 points. Azure finished in 2nd place with 32 points.

Wii did well to come back from a slightly ropey start and claimed 3rd place with good 27 points, putting them four points ahead of the next placed team. Both Azure and Wii are Langar teams who were competing for the first time. They put in a solid performance on home soil to claim their medals.

UKSL 2011 - Langar			Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Total	Avg
Rank	Rookie		A,Q,B	L,E,N	M,D,J	G,A,L	K,O,F	Total	Avg
1	UK RAFSPA Hurricane	INT	8	7	7	6	9	37	7.4
2	UK Azure	INT	7	6	6	6	7	32	6.4
3	UK Wii	INT	4	5	7	5	6	27	5.4
4	UK Better Than Average	INT	6	5	4	0	8	23	4.6
5	UK Gringo	INT	5	4	3	3	5	20	4.0
6	UK Kamikaze Satsumas	INT	4	2	6	2	3	17	3.4
7	UK Beech And Her Boys	INT	4	0	1	3	4	12	2.4

A Class Competition

The A Class competition was with a different team leading after each of the first three rounds. The top five teams in this category had all competed at the previous meet, which created some familiar battles. Raykipo triumphed with 45 points giving them an impressive 9.0 average.

Enigma Nom and RAFSPA Phoenix took 2nd and 3rd respectively with scores of 41 and 40. That left Team Toushi and RAFSPA Typhoon in 4th and 5th on 36 and 35 points respectively. Raykipo is now sitting comfortably at the top of the UKSL league after winning two meets. However, it is still all to play for with two meets to go to decide final positions.

UKSL 2011 - Langar			Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Total	Avg
Rank	A Class		A,Q,21	6,L	M,D,7	2,G	K,O,F	Total	Avg
1	UK Raykipo	INT	8	7	11	7	12	45	9.0
2	UK RAFSPA Phoenix	INT	10	4	9	4	14	41	8.2
3	UK Enigma Nom	INT	9	7	8	7	9	40	8.0
4	UK Toushi	INT	6	7	9	3	11	36	7.2
5	UK RAFSPA Typhoon	INT	8	5	7	5	10	35	7.0
5	UK High Altitude Heroes	INT	9	6	7	3	10	35	7.0
7	UK Enigma Pork Sword	INT	4	4	6	0	12	26	5.2
8	UK TB2A	INT	6	4	7	1	5	23	4.6

AA Class Competition

The AA Class was a familiar battleground with the top three teams having fought each other for medals at the previous meet. Eclipse (52) did consistently well across all the rounds to take their second gold of the season by a slim margin of three points. Gr4vity (49) came in 2nd and Kryos Airkix (45) were five points behind them in 3rd.

Langar team Gnomads had won Round 3 with an impressive 12-pointer but ended up in 4th having had an unfortunate start and an inconsistent performance. The close scores in the AA Class point to an exciting end to the season as there will almost certainly be some well-trained teams entering the category at the Hibaldstow UKSL and the British Nationals.

UKSL 2011 - Langar			Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Total	Avg
Rank	AA Class		18,A,Q	13,20	11,M,D	2,G,21	K,O,1	Total	Avg
1	UK Eclipse	INT	12	8	11	10	11	52	10.4
2	UK Gr4vity	INT	11	7	11	9	11	49	9.8
3	UK Kryos Airkix	INT	11	5	11	9	8	44	8.8
4	UK Gnomad	INT	0	2	12	3	4	21	4.2

AAA Class Competition

Once again it proved a struggle to attract AAA Class teams to this meet.

The field was limited to Cookie Monsters and Slot Machines. Local team Cookie Monsters took a very convincing win with a total of 54 and a 10.8 average.

Slot Machines managed to funnel the same number of exits at this competition as they did in their entire training camp and finished with a total of 32 points and a 6.4 average. There was some rivalry and comparison of scores between Cookie Monsters and Unagi, who were on a training weekend but completed the same draw as the teams at Langar. The first time these teams will meet will be the British Nationals and it will be interesting to watch the competition there.

Written by Jenny Buckle