posted Sep 13th, 2003 - The award ceremony and the closing ceremony on Saturday afternoon wrapped up an extraordinary event in many ways. Mondial 2003 offered exciting competition in all events. The event management was near to perfect. And the competition was very entertaining for the public audience, the media and last not least also for the athletes. Even though the weather was not perfect all the time, Mondial 2003 Director, Patrice Girardin, managed to complete all the events within the planned time frame.

In addition to the great management, Girardin had good fortune, as well. The last official Mondial 2003 day became the peak of the excitement and made it into the history books. The official schedule for Saturday had 8-way with the final round on the agenda as the first event, followed by 4-way Women and 4-way Open. France Maubeuge would have been the last team landing as the new world champion. It turned out in a different way. Arizona Airspeed and Russia decided to enjoy the competition a little longer with an additional round when they ended up tied after ten rounds. Airspeed had made up the missing one point in the last round. The story of the whole 8-way drama is posted at the Mondial 8-way page. This changed the plans and completed the whole event with the tie-breaking jump-off in 8-way. The two teams that had offered the most exciting competiton of the the whole Mondial 2003 had the honor to fly their parachutes in at the very end.

Of course, Meet Director Girardin was happy with this change of plans. It extended Saturday's jumping schedule by an hour. However, it was surely worth the while since he received in return the most exciting conclusion of a competition that is possible. It was the first jump-off for Excalibur in history, as far as the NSL News knows. It was also an addition for the history books that both swords for 4-way and 8-way will rest in other contries than the U.S.A., at least for one year. Airspeed came as close as can be to defend the American honors and save one of the famous trophies. It was an incredible effort by the U.S. team to come back and so close. But they were stopped by the strong Russian 8-way. The U.S. Formation Skydiving teams have now all turned from defending world champions to challengers for the 2004 event.

The awards and closing ceremony on Saturday was once again attended by a large crowd of local spectators who visited the event site just for the fun atmosphere and entertainment. There was not really that much skydiving happening any longer after the 8-way teams had landed. However, the event site with the always active large public screens and the actual award ceremony offered enough entertainment. Keeping the visitors and participants happy and entertained was obviously one of the management purposes. And it worked very well. Surprising features were waiting for everybody at different times.

Wednesday was Children's Day. School classes with teachers and kids visited from area schools and socialised with the skydivers at the team tents. Clowns and bands and artists added music and great shows for everybody right on competition site. Director Patrice Girardin gave the NSL News some insights when reporter Kurt Gaebel enjoyed the clowns: "You see, I am not the only trouble-maker in our family. Look at the boss clown with the red-painted face. That is my brother." Well, his brother's show was hilarious. And his clown gang endured the hot sun for almost two hours. The kids loved it. And the bigger kids had just as much fun.

The entertainment after dark was also well planned. Many participants consumed the free beer every night together with locals. And the event management had even planned some extra features while the beer was flowing in front of the dinner tents. Sometimes it looked like Disney World. The whole party time actually began Friday evening after many of the teams were eliminated and did not make it into the Semifinals and the ninth round. Some of the other events were also already completed earlier on Friday, including the award ceremonies. It was time to celebrate.