posted Mar 21st, 2007 - The all-female Fastrax Blue line-up caught the NSL News attention for the first time on 28 December 2006 (Archives > 2006 > News). The team was formed at the end of the 2006 season, and the NSL News story introduced the members of the new line-up.

The preview of the FSL Shamrock Showdown 2007 on 11 March 2007 confirmed that Fastrax Blue would attend the team's first competition with the new line-up in DeLand last weekend.

The all-female team found even more attention on the first day of the competition when the Orlando Sentinel selected Fastrax Blue for a feature story covering the Shamrock Showdown. The article was published in the Sunday issue of the newspaper, and the NSL News story on March 18 posted a copy of it.

The NSL News was interested in feedback directly from the team members on how they perceived the cooperation with the media during the competition and invited the team to the NSL office for a live interview. Fastrax Blue had two more training days scheduled in DeLand after the Shamrock Showdown, and the interview was recorded on Monday.

The visit began with an unusual invasion of the NSL office. An open window allowed the team members, with coach Thomas Hughes leading the invaders, to enter without a warning. However, the NSL News was prepared for the interview, which then took place a few minutes after the surprising entry. The invasion was caught on video and can be viewed by clicking here.

The actual interview included a brief introduction of the team members, followed by the discussion of the team's cooperation with the media. The Team Fastrax business plan includes PR and media campaigns, and all team members try to contribute to the media work. This was the first time for Fastrax Blue in the media's spotlight.

Of course, the NSL News asked for feedback of the actual competition at the Shamrock Showdown. Coach and team members were pleased with the results, and they revealed the thoughts and ideas behind the team strategy of "Go Slow" throughout the ten rounds of the Shamrock Showdown.

Finally, the interview included an outlook into the 2007 season and the perspectives for the team as the potential national US team in FAI's female category throughout the 2008 season. For the next competition, Fastrax Blue will attend the first competition of the Californis Skydiving League in April in Elsinore. The video of the whole interview can be viewed by clicking here.

Fastrax Blue also features the second round of the competition last weekend, which is now completely available on NSL-TV. The team followed the meet strategy in DeLand, "went slow" and tied Optic Nerve and Teiwaz with a 14-pointer.

Round 2 was one of the slow rounds of the competition, and the four top teams each finished with 19 points as the official score for this round. Norway Arcteryx had a 17-pointer, the three 14-pointers were next on the leaderboard.

There was still a 2-second difference between the best performance and the slowest 19-pointer, which is not reflected by the actual numbers on the scoreboard. Team Fastrax completed the first Bundy of Block 12 at 32.68 seconds on the NSL clock and was only half a second away from a 20-pointer.

The Golden Knights just completed the first Bundy before working time ran out (34.68 seconds). DeLand Groove was only a little bit faster than the Army team (34.47 seconds). Airspeed Odyssey was well within working time (33.26 seconds) and half a second behind Fastrax. However, four 19-pointers were on the scoreboard after Round 2.