posted Sep 29th, 2017 - The 8-way competition at the USPA Nationals 2017 was completed successfully and early on Thursday.

The award ceremony began with honoring two guest teams who placed 2nd and 3rd on the 8-way leaderboard and could not win USPA medals, before the Golden Knights took their usual place on the highest spot of the podium. The Fly-In Machine 44 from Belgium and the Qatar Falcons gave the 8-way competition even more of an international atmosphere than the two Belgian teams did in 4-way.

The Belgian 8-way combination of NMP PCH HayaBusa and ISR FireFlash managed to achieve something that had not happened since December 2015, when the Russian 8-way team Tanay won a round over the Golden Knights at the World Air Games. The Fly-In Machine outscored the U.S. Army team in Round 1 and Round 3 on Wednesday and were one point ahead before the Golden Knights cleaned up their performance and picked up the pace. A total of five penalties in the first three rounds had helped the Belgians to be in the lead.

However, the 18.5 average of the Fly-In Machine 44 after ten rounds still speaks its own language. The same total would have brought the Belgian 8-way team into medal contention at the FAI Mondial 2016, and the Belgians posted the 8-way scores after approx. 90 training jumps this year.

USPA Nationals 2017			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	8-way Open		G,22,1	9,6,2	D,7,17	8,J,C,K	Q,B,14,20	19,15,4	A,10,13	12,M,N,P	H,O,3,16	5,21,11	Total	Avg
1	Golden Knights	US	22	17	16	19	21	22	19	21	28	17	202	20.2
2	Fly-In Machine 44	BE	23	16	17	16	15	21	16	20	26	15	185	18.5
3	Qatar Falcons	QA	16	12	15	12	15	16	13	17	20	13	149	14.9
4	Arizona Airspeed	US	17	14	11	15	15	17	14	13	18	13	147	14.7
5	Amphibious Attack Tigers	US	18	12	13	10	13	18	14	16	15	11	140	14.0
6	SDC Rhythm XP8	US	12	11	12	13	11	15	12	15	14	12	127	12.7
7	Paraclete XP8	US	13	11	10	11	12	14	12	11	14	10	118	11.8
8	Spaceland Gummies 8	US	11	11	8	7	10	12	9	10	10	9	97	9.7
9	Perris Spider Pigs	US	5	7	4	5	6	5	7	5	4	7	55	5.5

The second international team, the Qatar Falcons, finished with a new team record average, as well, after training mostly in 4-way since the Mondial 2016.

The Falcons had an exciting 2-point battle with Arizona Airspeed's 8-way lineup and can take back home the desired additional meet experiences.

Both teams were guided by coach Gary Smith, even though he was mainly in charge of the Qatar Falcons while helping the Fly-In Machine 44 as much as he could. He has been coaching NMP PCH HayaBusa to their two 4-way gold medals in 2014 and 2016. The Belgians then decided to add some 8-way training and competition to their team agenda this year, and Gary Smith was naturally involved when both events happened to take place at the same place and time in training and competition.

The NSL News followed Gary Smith on his path around the competition site on the second day of the 8-way competition from one round to the next one. There was not much spare time, and he was fortunate enough that both teams happened to be in the same Twin Otter loads.

He had to deal with more than only the preparations of the teams for their next rounds. As for one example, Chief Judge Jim Rees, who was missing the competition in his Mass Defiance slot, had to ask the Qatar videographer for an adjustment of the dubbing procedure, and Gary Smith was in charge to communicate the requirement. The NSL Profile of Gary Smith ends in 2001, after he had won bronze medals with the South African team Equanimity at the FAI World Meet 1997 and moved to Florida to continue his skydiving career.

Living in DeLand, he formed DeLand Majik with Equanimity team mate Solly Williams, Joey Jones and Doug Park and won 4-way gold medals for the U.S.A. in Croatia 2004. His coaching career was already in full swing at that time. However, he continued as an active competitor and became a player coach for DeLand Fire, the next 4-way world champions of 2006 (Natasha Montgomery, Shannon Pilcher, Ian Bobo, Jonathan Tagle on camera).

His DeLand Fire team mate Natasha Montgomery lives in California and visited Skydive Perris yesterday to meet Gary Smith and enjoy the meet atmosphere.

Gary Smith added 8-way coaching to his professional agenda after he had moved to the Netherlands and worked as a player coach with the Dutch national team M8trix. He connected with HayaBusa after the team's dramatic 2nd place finish at the FAI Mondial 2012 and has been working with the Belgians ever since, including the two consecutive 4-way gold medals in 2014 and 2016.

The third set of gold medals is the next goal, and the 8-way project will be discontinued - at least for now and throughout the FAI World Meet 2018...