posted Aug 9th, 2006 - Wednesday has been a turbulent day so far. The weather situation makes it very difficult for teams, competitors and management to keep the meet moving forward. The judges had to give up on some of the jumps when they were not able to identify formations and maneuvers due to the industrial haze.

Teams received re-jumps when it was necessary, and three teams of the 4-way Open Class are currently waiting for their re-jumps of round four. Russia (7), France (18) and Germany (14) could not be viewed properly and will get a second chance.

Perris Airkix already repeated round three. The British team had completed 21 points at the first attempt and ended up with 17 visible scoring formations. The re-jump had 20 points in time, and one point was deducted for an infringement. The official 19-pointer was enough to break the tie with France and take a 1-point lead. The French team lost one point in the same round, as well.

Not much has changed in the 8-way competition, even though two more rounds have been completed. The teams have settled in their positions, and France increased the lead by one point in round five. Russia safely holds the third place, and Italy has moved away from the German 8-way team for the 4th place. The only closer 8-way competition takes place between Great Britain and Australia for the 6th place and between South Africa and Belgium at the bottom of the field.

The 4-way Open Class is currently the most exciting competition. DeLand Fire lost two points to Sinapsi PD in round four and has made the situation more interesting again. The Italian team needed a confidence booster and might have got it at the right time. The difference is down to three points, and these scores are already officially posted.

The re-jumps for Russia, France and Belgium will still change the current leaderboard. The Sky Panthers Barkli will have the chance to get back to their second-place position, and Belgium can also move back up into the top five rankings.

Spa Hayabusa had bad luck this morning. Very important personal reasons forced the team into the decision to leave the competition site this morning. The Belgium team missed its jump plane for the 3rd round and had to get in the air later on. As the Belgian 8-way team had experienced earlier, the rules punish this case with a 20% deduction off the total points.

Spa Hayabusa completed 23 points within working time and saved 22 points after one infringement. Four points were deducted due to the 20% rule, and the official score was the posted 18-pointer.

The Belgium team had explained the personal situation to their fellow competitors, and each 4-way Open Class team in Gera signed a petition to give Spa Hayabusa the score without the point deduction. It did not work out since the rules do not accept any reasons for missing the jump plane, and the Chief Judge had to send the Belgian team to the Jury.

Spa Hayabusa still hopes that the missing four points will be added to the total number of points after the decision of the Jury. A similar situation had already occurred at the World Meet 2001 in Spain where Russia had missed the load due to low-volume announcements of the boarding calls.

Airspeed member Alan Metni argued successfully on the behalf of the Russian 8-way team, and Russia was allowed to make the jump and receive all scoring points. The Russian team won the competition by one point, and Alan Metni made history in the rule book of fair play.

Four additional points would bring back the Belgian team into medal contention, and the other top teams would like to see this happen. Spa Hayabusa still has to jump round four, and the jump planes are back in the air at 5:00 pm German time.