posted Jul 18th, 2006 - The story of the 5th Florida Skydiving League competition this year comes along with the first meet videos. Skydive City hosted its second FSL meet of the 2006 season, and three of the FSL regulars made the trip to Zephyrhills in the Florida summer heat.

Skydive City's A Class team with Paul Bartkus (Tail), Carrie Bramlet (Point), Leslieann McCormack (Inside Center) and James Saine (Outside Center) improved the meet average once again (6.3 - 6.7 - 8.8 - 8.8 - 9.2) and included a new team record with the 14-pointer in round four.

The 6-round competition on home turf began with confusion in round one, as the currently posted video shows. However, the 5-pointer did not discourage the home team, and the low meet opener was already history after round two. It seems to be only a matter of time when Skydive City will break the 10.0 average level this year.

The A Class team did not have to face the FSL opposition from Miami this time. The strongest A Class competition came from the Mid Atlantic Skydiving League where Cold Fusion ended up one single point behind Skydive City with a 9.0 meet average.

The FSL team did not really expect the top spot in the A Class after the meet in Zephyrhills. However, the 9.2 average currently holds the first place on last weekend's leaderboard. It would be Skydive City's third consecutive first place on the A Class leaderboard of the according weekends. Only teams of the Northwest Skydiving League could still push Skydive City off the top spot. The NWSL scores are expected to be added to the leaderboard at any time.

The FSL representative in the AA Class, FSC Wind Damaged, was facing level problems throughout the meet in Zephyrhills and was working hard to complete the six rounds. In fact, the last round fell victim to a camera problem, and FSC Wind Damaged's meet average had to be calculated after only five rounds.

The 7.8 meet average appears to be the lowest score of the 2006 season and placed the Lake Wales team in 8th position of the AA Class leaderboard. However, the meet average suffers due to the fact that FSC Wind Damaged did not complete the meet and missed the chance for the highest score in round six. The teams are listed by meet averages on the NSL leaderboards, and FSC's score would have been significantly higher with a reasonable performance in the missing round six.

Teiwaz Lake Wales did not hesitate to use the opportunity for highscores in Zephyrhills. The 17.0 meet average and the 26-pointer in round six were record results for three members of last weekend's line-up. Teiwaz took the second place of the AAA Class leaderboard behind the French national team in the female category, France Maubeuge.

Teiwaz point Kris Byrne, who joined forces once again with her husband Bob Byrne, Robert Chromy and Kurt Gaebel, was especially interested in comparing the Teiwaz scores with the numbers coming from France. She is a member of the US team that will compete at the World Meet 2006 in Germany next month, Elsinore Select. France Maubeuge is the top contender for the gold medals, and Kris Byrne will meet the French team soon in direct competition.

Teiwaz Lake Wales was able to tie the French highscore once in round three and kept quite close in most of the rounds. However, the well trained French team walked away after a very consistent performance after six rounds and ended up with an 18.0 average after eight rounds.

Kris Byrne does not expect to threaten the French team with Elsinore Select this year. She hopes for a chance to go after the other sets of medals at the upcoming world meet. Her own team, Elsinore Select, will attend the Southwest Skydiving League competition in Elsinore this weekend.

This will offer the next opportunity for the busy national and future international competitor to check the current performance level. It will be Elsinore Select's 2nd meet of the 2006 season, while Kris Byrne has already attended four additional FSL meets with Teiwaz.