posted May 31st, 2006 - The record weekend of May 20 with 62 teams competing in the USA and Europe offered the content for many stories. Several of these meet stories have already been posted. They can be found in the NSL News overview and its search engine, and links to the stories are also set at the pages of each league's event.

Austria and Germany were part of the record weekend and contributed to the record number of participating teams with several teams competing at three different locations. The NSL News story on May 23 covered one part of the international competition when the Austrian team Monkey Circus and FSL team Teiwaz Lake Wales had their own internal race for the third place in the AAA/Open Class competition.

Monkey Circus is not the current national 4-way team for Austria. Team FILA won the qualification for the World Meet 2006 last year and will represent the country in August. However, Monkey Circus will still compete at the World Meet this year. Team FILA and Monkey Circus formed the FILA Circus 8-way team last year and won the national championship in Austria. FILA Circus is already registered for the 8-way competition at the world meet.

The situation was very similar for a team in Germany that competed on the May 20 weekend, as well. X-Ray Remscheid was right next to Teiwaz and Monkey Circus in the AAA/Open Class rankings that weekend. The German team was shortly behind in 5th position and was the strongest German team on May 20, together with the German Army team.

X-Ray Remscheid is not the German national 4-way team though. Team EADS is currently far ahead of all other teams in Germany and will compete on home turf in August. However, the X-Ray Remscheid members, Peter Grossmann, Dr. Ulrich Sehrbrock, Uwe Soppa and Dr. Henning Stumpp, are also members of the German 8-way team FSC Remscheid and will represent the country at this year's world meet. FSC Remscheid was introduced with the NSL News story on May 19.

Monkey Circus and X-Ray Remscheid both competed in 4-way on May 20 and will face off in 8-way at the World Meet 2006. However, there is still a difference betwween the two teams. Monkey Circus is specialized on 4-way and steps into the Austrian 8-way team as a by-product. The X-Ray Remscheid members have focused their efforts on the 8-way event and competed in 4-way for the fun of it. Monkey Circus won the 4-way showdown, Germany will probably win the 8-way competition with Austria.

The two May 20 events in Germany included more interesting international aspects. The former German national 4-way team in the Women's Class, Chicas, finished right behind X-Ray Remscheid and the German Army team with a 12.3 meet average after four rounds. The NSL News had explained the complicated situation in Germany's 4-way Women's Class competition with the story on May 7.

Chicas' 12.3 average puts pressure on this year's national team in the Women's Class, FSC Remscheid's line-up with Susanne Fleig, Kristina Monsees, Birgit Powell and Katrin Schreyer. The 12.3 average on May 20 is far ahead of any previous scoring average in the history of the Women's event in Germany. It was only a 4-round competition. However, the Chicas kept up with other AAA/Open Class teams, including Teiwaz Lake Wales, Monkey Circus and X-Ray Remscheid.

FSC Remscheid's national team in the Women's Class did not compete on May 20 and has not much current competition experience with the 2006 line-up. The Deutsche Sky Liga has two more competitions scheduled before the World Meet 2006 begins in August. FSC Remscheid still has the opportunity to get some competition practice before the biggest challenge of the 2006 season. The Chicas have the Malevsky Cup 2006 on the team agenda and will watch the World Meet 2006 with great interest.