posted Mar 5th, 2008 - Airspeed Odyssey's missing Round 1 has now been added to the other meet videos of the Valentine's Meet 2008. The sequence for the 21-pointer (A-10-D-11) began with a Unipod, which Odyssey exited from the Pilatus Porter as a complete formation.

Eliana Rodriguez, Andy Delk, Craig Girard, Mark Kirkby and Steve Novak are now getting ready for the trip to Florida and the FSL Shamrock Showdown 2008, the second stop of the same 3-meet journey that Airspeed Odyssey completed last year within a time period of six weeks.

The third stop will be the World Challenge 2008 at Bodyflight Bedford in the United Kingdom, two weeks after the Shamrock Showdown.

The NSL News story on 24 January 2008 mentioned that Bodyflight Bedford owner Paul Meyer would not be surprised to see more than 30 teams compete at this year's event. 19 teams were in Bedford for the World Challenge 2007 in April 2007, and 26 teams had already signed up for the upcoming windtunnel meet when the NSL News story was posted in January.

The update on 1 February 2008 already confirmed Paul Meyer's expectation that the number of teams would probably be 30 and higher. 32 teams were already registered at that time. The Bodyflight Bedford owner added by then that he is ready to accommodate up to 40 teams.

Paul Meyer will be glad now that he has been prepared for such a record participation. The number of currently registered teams for the World Challenge 2008 stands exactly at 40.

29 teams have signed up for the AAA Class competition, 11 teams will fly in the AA Class. Last year's leader throughout the first five rounds, Team XL, has recruited a lineup for this year's event, as well, and it will probably be just as competitive.

John McIver will not be available since has to fill his player coach position for Sonic V. Pete Allum, Steve Hamilton and Brian Johnson found an adequate alternate though. Pete Allum's and Steve Hamilton's former XL teammate Thomas Hughes was competing with Team Fastrax last year and finished one point behind Airspeed Odyssey in second place.

Team Fastrax will not be in Bedford this year, and the Fastrax members prepare for the World Championship of Formation Skydiving with the US 8-way team Knight Trax. However, Thomas Hughes will make the trip to the United Kingdom in April, and this year's XL reunion will have him in the lineup.

The Belgian Army registered a second lineup that trained and competed already last year under the guidance of Hayabusa Defence. Hayabusa Beta attended three meets in 2007, including the ESL Championship (13.9 - 14.0 - 13.3), and continues this year.

South Parc is another British team that signed up for the AAA Class competition. Sequence from Denmark is the B-Team of the national 4-way project and will also compete at the FSL Shamrock Showdown 2008 two weeks before the windtunnel competition.

The Tigers are the national champion team of the past years from Finland and will continue the previous outdoor duel with the Pro Team in the windtunnel. The Pro Team is from Finland, as well.

Magic 4 from Lithuania and Phantom Force from Belgium have now made the AA Class competition a more exciting international event, as well. Team Future from the USA, with the two flying kids, was the only AA Class team from abroad so far. The three international teams are facing eight teams from the United Kingdom.