posted Apr 23rd, 2019 - The greatly anticipated showdown between reigning FAI indoor and outdoor world champion NMP PCH HayaBusa, reigning FAI indoor world cup champion Weembi High Rollers, and Arizona Airspeed lived up to all expectations, even though the final placings of the three best 4-way teams in the world did not bring any surprises.

All three teams posted scores on the level that they had shown before, only with different competition draws, and only at the end of three different roads to Weembi Lille.

The Belgian world champions knew that they had work to do after losing the top spot to Weembi High Rollers at the FAI Indoor World Cup 2018. They did their home work and started with intensive indoor training after the end of the 2018 season and the team's winter break.

As a result, the indoor averages went back up to 34+ and then 35+ after the 33.3 in Bahrain, which had not been enough to outscore the French opponents. In fact, HayaBusa became the first team to leave the 35-point benchmark behind in the preparations for the indoor world meet, at the Wind Games in January. The 34.7 at the World Challenge then confirmed that the Belgians would be ready for the next 35+ performance after more indoor training between the two events in April. The 35.1 last week eventually became the second highest average in 4-way history.

FAI Indoor World Meet 2019			1		2		3		4		5		6		7		8		9		10		Total	Avg
Rank	4-way Open		M,K,D,14		Q,4,5		P,E,9,15		3,N,G,2		6,1,8		F,12,11		13,22,J		H,L,B,18		O,20,A,17		21,7,19		Total	Avg
1	NMP-PCH Hayabusa	BE	39		36		42		35		27		32		29		42	-1	38		31		351	35.1
2	Weembi High Rollers	FR	38	-2	33	-1	44		32	-1	27		29	-1	26	-2	47		37		31		344	34.4
3	Arizona Airspeed	US	39		33		40		30		27		29		24	-3	39		33		27		321	32.1
4	Qatar Tigers	QA	34		30	-2	36		29		22	-3	27	-1	28		36		32		28		302	30.2
5	Airheads	CH	35		28	-1	33	-2	29		25		27		24	-1	36		30		25	-1	292	29.2
6	Black Cat	RU	34		29		39	-1	29		25		22	-2	25	-1	36	-1	26	-3	22	-2	287	28.7
7	Echochamber	SE	34		27	-1	35		26	-1	22	-2	25		20	-5	35		26	-3	24	-1	274	27.4
8	ACM Weembi	UK	32	-1	28		32	-2	26	-1	20	-1	24		19	-2	35		26		25		267	26.7
9	Airfource	DE	33	-3	22	-1	33	-1	25		22	-1	23		20	-3	35	-2	25	-1	24	-1	262	26.2
10	HF Flying Circus	CZ	31		26		28	-1	23		24		22		18	-2	33		19	-5	23		247	24.7
11	Pro Team	FI	27	-2	24		30		23		23		22		22		30		23	-3	22	-1	246	24.6
12	Monaco Indoor Skydive Team	MC	27	-1	21		27	-2	23		20		22		21		29		21		21		232	23.2
13	FlySpot Sky4Four	PL	27	-1	23		28	-1	23		19	-2	20	-1	20		29		21	-1	21	-1	231	23.1
14	Papea Masculino	ES	28	-2	23		26	-1	16	-3	21	-1	20	-1	21		30	-1	23	-2	22		230	23.0
15	Out of the Blue	NL	24		22		27		19	-1	19		19		18		27		24		20	-1	219	21.9
16	H40	IE	22	-1	19		23		17		18		17	-1	17	-1	24		20		19		196	19.6
17	Skydive University Slovakia	SK	23	-2	19		23	-1	17	-2	18		17	-1	14	-3	22		19		17	-2	189	18.9
18	Lithuania	LT	26		15	-1	19	-5	15	-2	17		16	-3	17	-1	21		-		-		146	18.3

NMP PCH HayaBusa - Weembi High Rollers - Arizona Airspeed at the FAI Indoor World Meet 2019

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Weembi High Rollers knew that NMP PCH HayaBusa had lifted their performance level significantly after Bahrain 2018. Both teams met again at the Wind Games in January, where HayaBusa finished with the historic 35.4 average, while the French national indoor team scored lower than in Bahrain.

However, there seemed to be enough time left to fix the difference, with more than two months until the indoor world meet. The game had changed though, as Weembi High Rollers were back in the hunting position after the victory in Bahrain.

The 31.0 at the French Indoor Nationals in March was not very promising, and it was countered by HayaBusa with the 34.7 in Bedford. The momentum was clearly on the Belgian side when the teams arrived at Weembi Lille.

Weembi High Rollers managed to pull everything together at the right time and were back on the Bahrain performance level, which was not enough this time. It still created the most exciting new showdown at the indoor world meet, even though HayaBusa won by seven points. Both teams performed on the same pace level and completed almost exactly the same number of points in the 350 seconds of working time (352 - 351). Weembi High Rollers lost seven points in the judging room, while HayaBusa finished as the cleanest team on the 4-way Open Class leaderboard with only one point deduction.

Live judging of Round 10 at Weembi Lille

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Arizona Airspeed was in a similar situation as Weembi High Rollers and were back to their highest performance and scoring level at the indoor world meet. The U.S. team had shown their 32+ average level two times in Bedford (32.4 - 32.2) including this year's competition ten days before the indoor world meet.

Airspeed did not allow any other team to get within striking distance for the FAI indoor bronze medals. The 32.1 average was still not even close to the Belgians, who they had threatened very seriously at the FAI Outdoor World Meet in Australia last year. The Weembi High Rollers indoor experts were also too strong for Airspeed at Weembi Lille.

As HayaBusa, Airspeed had only one of the ten rounds with judging troubles, even though the penalties did not change the outcome of the final rankings.

HayaBusa and Airspeed will switch to outdoor training and competition now, while Weembi High Rollers take a break. Sophia Pecout and Christine Malnis re-join with Clementine Le Bohec and train with new member Gaelle Giesen to defend the French world championship title in 4-way Women. At the same time, the complete lineup has 8-way training and competition as the main goal until Tanay 2020. Weembi High Rollers will get whatever is left of remaining time for indoor training...