posted Oct 5th, 2011 - Round 8 in 8way at the World Cup 2011 was extraordinary. It was the only round of the whole competition where no team had any point deductions. The extended leaderboard looks exactly the same as it did after Round 7.

That was nothing unusual for the two teams on the top of the leaderboard. Neither the Golden Knights nor Aerodyne Maubeuge had any penalty calls so far, and this would not change until the meet would be over. There was actually a third team that performed much to the liking of the 8way judges. The Swiss team VIVA was clean all the way through, as well.

VIVA missed the last round though and could not post any more scores, with or without point deductions. The NSL News reported earlier that VIVA was accepted as a guest team when French 8way world champions Martial Ferre filled an open slot, due to availability problems for the original lineup. The weather situation was critical at this point in time, and the meet management decided to leave the guest team on the ground.

World Cup 2011		Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Round 6	Round 7	Round 8	Round 9	Total	Avg
Rank	8way Open	7,M,15	8,14,D	5,18,J	B,9,2	Q,K,12,20	21,A,F,10	1,4,E	13,P,H,6	L,19,17	Total	Avg
1	Golden Knights	23	18	18	19	23	21	25	20	19	186	20.7
2	Aerodyne Maubeuge	21	18	19	18	23	19	29	21	17	185	20.6
3	Sky Panthers Barkli	17	15	14 (-2)	17	16 (-3)	15 (-1)	19	19	15	147	16.3
4	Germany EADS	15 (-1)	13	14	9 (-4)	16	15	22	15	14	133	14.8
5	Switzerland VIVA	15	11	12	14	15	14	18	14	-	113	14.1
6	UK Brit Chicks	10 (-1)	10 (-1)	11	11	13	11	15	13	10	104	11.6
7	Germany Südwest	12	9 (-1)	8	10	11 (-1)	11	12 (-2)	12	11	96	10.7
8	Russia Phoenix 11	11	8	9 (-2)	11	10	11	9 (-3)	11	6	86	9.6
9	Netherlands M8Trix	8	6 (-1)	9 (-1)	6 (-2)	9 (-1)	8	9 (-2)	11	8	74	8.2
10	Germany Saar 8	7	7	4 (-2)	7	3 (-2)	5	5 (-3)	8	6	52	5.8

Earlier NSL News stories explained how the weather would have an impact on the outcome of the 8way competition. The skies already did not look very friendly when the 8way teams went up for Round 8. The 8way teams were eventually able to complete one more round, but the competition was over after Round 9.

The competition in the female 4way category was completed after ten rounds at this point in time, and Aerodyne Aerokart had secured the 1st place in the 4way Open competition. There was a good battle between Paratec-Saar and Sky Panthers Barkli for the bronze medals in the 4way Open Class competition going on. However, the real deal took place in the 8way event.

It was a horse race between Golden Knights and Aerodyne Aerokart so far. The US Army team had the lead from the first round on and was four points ahead before Round 7 came with the fastest sequence of the meet. France won by four points and tied the US lead. Then the French team used the momentum and took a 1-point lead for the first time in Round 8. It was a real thriller.

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The thriller included the logistics. France was in the same situation as Paratec-Saar and Sky Panthers Barkli in their battle for the 4way bronze medals. All three teams were competing in both 4way and 8way. The weather situation was critical, and it was difficult to predict which event would be next. Those three teams had to be well prepared for whatever would come up.

France had already put away the 4way competition, more or less. There was still the fastest sequence of the meet coming up in Round 10. However, the 8-point lead after Round 8 should be good enough. The pressure was much higher in 8way where the Golden Knights focused only on the 8way competition.

Aerodyne Aerokart had managed to win Round 7 and Round 8 by a total of five points and was looking forward to another fast sequence in Round 10. But first came Round 9 where the Golden Knights would take back the lead after winning the round by two points in extremely critical weather and judging conditions. The videos of Round 9 will follow soon.