posted Apr 15th, 2007 - This weekend brings the 2007 season opener of the California Skydiving League. The former Southwest Skydiving League was split into the California and the Arizona Skydiving League, as the NSL News story on January 25 reported.

The Arizona Skydiving League kicked off the 2007 season with the Valentine's Meet in February. Skydive Elsinore is now the host of the first meet in California.

The 2006 season in California featured the neck-to-neck race between Perris Fury and Elsinore Gravity. The NSL News covered this exciting 2-team competition in the AAA Class several times last year. It lasted until the USPA Nationals 2006 and ended when Elsinore Gravity suffered severe losses due to camera problems in Perris.

Perris Fury ended up as one of the most positive surprises at the USPA Nationals 2006 and followed up with ambitious plans for the 2007 season. Elsinore Gravity discontinued at the end of the 2006 season.

The NSL News has reported several times this year on the progression of Perris Fury's full-time project. The Perris team had finished in 5th place at the USPA Nationals 2006 with a 19.9 average. The first meet of the 2007 season, the Valentine's Meet in February, saw Perris Fury already above the 20.0 benchmark (20.3) after ten rounds.

Chris Farina (Inside Center), Christy Frikken (Outside Center), Josh Hall (Point) and Uli Steuwe (Tail) are not planning to improve the team's best meet average this weekend. The season opener of the new California Skydiving League in Elsinore has each player once again in a player coach position.

The Perris Fury members have created new 4-way and 8-way line-ups for the 2007 season, which will train and compete with their player coaches throughout the year. The meet in Elsinore is the first opportunity for these line-ups to have fun and compete directly with each other. The NSL News will introduce the 2007 line-ups after the conclusion of this weekend's competition.

The NSL News is still in the middle of the coverage of the World Challenge 2007 at Bodyflight Bedford. Perris Fury spent quite some tunnel time in Bedford this year, as well, as the team reported earlier. New Fury pictures from the team's headquarters include a Fury visit to London during the trip to Bedford.

Veteran 4-way competitor John Hamilton and his staff at Skydive Elsinore have also been very successful with their player coach projects in the past. The NSL News has not received any information of new Elsinore line-ups so far.

This weekend's competition will show how the 4-way season begins on the shores of Lake Elsinore.

One of the strongest teams at Skydive Elsinore this weekend is probably the new Fastrax line-up in the female category. Fastrax Blue, with Becky Broccato (Tail), Kelley Fredrickson (Point), Erin Murphy (Outside Center) and Brianne Thompson (Inside Center), already had a great start into this season at the FSL Shamrock Showdown 2007.

Thomas Hughes, Center Inside of Team Fastrax and coach for Fastrax Blue, guided the team to a 15.2 average in DeLand in March. The Fastrax Blue members still had to go slow by then, as they complained in the live interview with the NSL News on March 21.

Coach Thomas Hughes is in Elsinore with his team, and the scores will show whether Fastrax Blue has picked up the pace in the meantime or not. The Fastrax Blue members followed the recent tunnel action at the World Challenge 2007 very carefully on-line and were proud of the very fast pace that their coach was going in Bedford...

Stay tuned, the scores will be posted as soon as possible.