posted Jul 17th, 2009 - Today is officially the first competition day at the World Games 2009.

The first event briefings brought quite a surprise to the participating teams in the 4-way Formation Skydiving competition.

Arizona Airspeed members Andy Delk and Craig Girard both confirmed that the jump plane will be a helicopter with a right-hand door. That was a complete surprise for the teams who expected to jump from a left-hand door in Taiwan. The training day was also much needed for the pilots who did not seem too experienced with dropping teams on the spot.

Airspeed's Center Inside Andy Delk explained more of the training experiences on Thursday:

"We are currently completing the practice jumps. Each team is getting a chance to make one jump to get familiar with the helicopter and landing area. Due to clouds and lack of familiarity from the jumpers and the pilots, quite a few are landing off. Nonetheless, the meet management is working as hard as they can to keep things moving. The facilities and staff are fantastic and the enthuiasm of the group is still very high. I believe everyone feels like they are part of something special.

I think each of the teams got a bit of a surprise during the pre meet briefing. We were told the competition would be out of the right door due to safety concerns with the helicopter. Apparently the pilot had decided this months ago but neglected to tell the meet director until the day before the meet. Also, as it turns out, this meet will be a 6-round meet. Hopefully the weather cooperates and all of the competitors are able to put on display worthy of the olympics."

The Airspeed members took the surprising news with the usual positive attitude and will find their way how to deal with the new situation. Craig Girard mentioned already that it should not be a major problem. He said that the FS 4-way teams in Taiwan all competed from the same Pilatus Porters at the World Meet 2008 in France, which was the qualifyer for the World Games 2009.

Other than dealing with the jump plane surprise, Eliana Rodriguez, Craig Girard, Andy Delk, Mark Kirkby and Steve Nowak enjoyed the days leading into the actual competition, with yesterday's training jumps and today's first meet day. Craig Girard had a summary of the previous days for the NSL News:

"We spent the day getting ready to go to the Accreditation briefing for the World Games. There were many athletes at the Kaohsiung City Hall, and as I was reading in the information pamphlet, there are more than 5,000 athletes from 105 countries. This is the 8th World Games and the biggest by far. I hope to have some photo's of the new stadium they built here just for this event. This event is a big one!

We got our team registered and spent the day shopping and sightseeing. We are living in downtown Koahsiung right near the night tourist market. There is a meeting tonight for all the skydivers and we should find out something more.

We rode the bus from the hotel to the City Hall with most of the skydivers who have already arrived. I saw Chris Gay and his two teammates, the Solstice guys, and Jay Moledski. While we were there, the French delegation arrived straight from the airport. It was great to see them again. I also saw the Belgian team last night at the night market and they said that they had just arrived, as well."

This means that the three top contenders are in Taiwan and ready to go. Hopefully the next update from the World Games 2009 will already bring the first scores of the competition.