posted Jan 28th, 2013 - The first bigger meet of the 2013 season is coming up this weekend, the Paraclete XP Indoor Championship 2013.

The 4way fans will have the opportunity to check out the new Arizona Airspeed lineup, with special attention to Chris Farina in the Point slot.

SDC Rhythm XP is not competing with the full lineup, as Christy Frikken is not available at the season opener. XL member Brian Johnson is taking her slot in Raeford.

However, new Rhythm member Mikhail Markine will fly the Tail slot for the first time in a competition with his new team. He will surely draw as much attention as Chris Farina.

The NSL News provided a quick summary of Christy Frikken's 4way career and her move to the Rhythm headquarters on 18 January 2013.

The story came with the mention that an introduction of the other new Rhythm member, Mikhail Markine, will follow soon.

July 19th, 2008			Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Round 6	Total	Avg
Rank	Rookie	Â	O,A,B	G,C,K	F,M,J	E,O,G	H,N,L	D,Q,P	Total	Avg
1	B.A.M.	SCSL	7	3	16	9	6	4	45	7.5
2	Snatch Force	NESL	7	3	9	-	-	-	19	6.3
3	Evolution Miami	FSL	4	1	9	3	1	2	20	3.3
4	Accelerant	NESL	1	0	7	-	-	-	8	2.7
5	Auto Gyro	RSL	4	1	2	1	1	-	9	1.8

The passionate 4way competitor has been in the sport for only six years, which makes him an even younger skydiver than team mate Steve Lefkowitz who made his first jump in 2005. Mikhail Markine made over 2,200 in those six years and completed over 100 hours of wind tunnel training. That's almost 400 jumps per year as an amateur...

He started skydiving in Ontario, Canada, in 2006 at age 20 and made his first static line jump at the Parachute School of Toronto. He was on an engineering society trip for the University of Waterloo where he was studying electrical engineering at that time.

He followed up soon with PFF, the Canadian version of AFF, at the Niagara Skydive Centre, together with a classmate, and continued in Canada before moving to Northern California with 70 jumps in late 2007.

It did not take him very long to get addicted to 4way competition. He attended a summer meet of the California Skydiving League 2008 with a Rookie Class lineup in his first year of skydiving in the USA.

He wanted to keep building up his RW skills and had no idea that 4way would pull him in so hard.

USPA Nationals 2012		Rd. 1	Rd. 2	Rd. 3	Rd. 4	Rd. 5	Rd. 6	Rd. 7	Rd. 8	Rd. 9	Rd. 10	Total	Avg
Rank	Advanced Class	3,B,K,H	F,7,22	O,4,D,13	A,M,11,8	N,P,G,19	L,20,1	5,16,J	6,21,12	18,17,10	E,C,Q,15	Total	Avg
1	Vibe (US)	21	17	16	17	18	15	17	14	13	19	167	16.7
2	Dubai Asaar Red (AE)	17	17	16	16	20	14	19	14	11	18	162	16.2
3	Air Force Paradigm (US)	21	14	17	16	17	10	15	11	11	19	151	15.1
3	Air Force Legacy (US)	20	14	13	13	17	14	17	12	13	18	151	15.1
5	Dubai Asaar Gold (AE)	17	17	15	14	16	13	16	14	11	17	150	15.0
6	ZeBone (US)	15	14	14	16	18	12	15	12	8	15	139	13.9

Mikhail Markine's first Rookie Class team BAM trained locally in Northern California and was drawing from the experience of the local teams Kaleidoscope and R4.

Former Rhythm members Rob Radez (Center Inside) and Jason Imamura (Camera) trained and competed with R4 at that time.

He began to travel longer distances for his 4way passion when he stepped up into the AAA/Advanced Class competition with team Quattro who trained in Perris.

Fury member Chris Farina, who joined SDC Rhythm XP in 2012 and is now the Point for Arizona Airspeed, was coaching Mikhail Markine's new team. The other Fury members and Dan BC were helping out when Chris Farina was not available.

He was looking for a new team on a higher level in 2011 and had to wait for over a year until his Vibe lineup was finally complete. He used the hibernation season of 2011 to help team Uprising as much as he could with coaching and video in Lodi and at an SCSL meet in Perris. Rhythm members were also working on the same Uprising project together with him.

World Challenge 2012		Rd. 1	Rd. 2	Rd. 3	Rd. 4	Rd. 5	Rd. 6	Rd. 7	Rd. 8	Rd. 9	Rd. 10	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	D,Q,9,10	17,P,11	2,21,7	14,J,O,M	A,L,18,16	N,H,20,G	C,E,19,22	1,8,4	K,6,3	12,F,5	Total	Avg
1	NMP-PCH Hayabusa (BE)	34	33	25	36	28	35	30	25	28	30	304	30.4
2	Aerodyne Aerokart (FR)	31	31	25	37	28	33	26	23	27	30	291	29.1
3	Arizona Airspeed (US)	34	29	24	34	28	34	29	22	26	30	290	29.0
4	XL	30	27	24	32	26	31	27	21	24	26	268	26.8
5	SDC Rhythm XP (US)	29	23	22	29	21	30	26	21	23	23	247	24.7
5	France Aerokart Maubeuge	29	27	23	34	19	26	22	19	23	25	247	24.7
7	Thunder (BE)	29	25	23	31	16	23	26	21	24	23	241	24.1
8	Satori (UK)	27	24	21	32	22	27	20	19	23	23	238	23.8
9	USA Rabbit Restraint	24	19	19	31	19	25	23	17	20	23	220	22.0
10	Ex3mo 4 (IT)	26	23	19	25	17	24	21	16	22	19	212	21.2

Uprising did very well at the USPA Nationals 2011, and team member Don Burnette eventually joined the new Vibe lineup in 2012.

Up and rising member Christie Blomster became a Perris Wicked member in 2012.

The extremely successful Vibe 2012 season began for Mikhail Markine actually with his first trip to Bedford where he competed with Rabbit Restraint at the World Challenge 2012.

Former Perris Fury Tail Uli Stuwe was the team's player coach, Don Burnette and Andre van Heerden completed the lineup.

Rabbit Restraint posted a 22.0 average after only a few training sessions at Paraclete XP.

Mikhail Markine is now extremely excited about joining Rhythm: "I can't wait to start training!" The 2013 season begins with little training before the upcoming indoor competition at Paraclete XP.

The complete lineup will then compete at the Paraclete XP Outdoor Championship 2013 in DeLand and travel to Bedford in April.

Save £50 by registering until the 1st Feb 2013

SDC Rhythm XP's new Tail will also contribute to the Rhythm school. He has collected coaching and organizing experience is in Northern California. He has also organized 2way tunnel competitions similar to the ones Christy Frikken puts on in Perris, and he has tried to do his best to fill Rob Radez' shoes for 1-on-1 and 4way tunnel coaching when Rob Radez joined Rhythm. He also enjoys coaching fresh AFF graduates:

"It is very rewarding as we've been able to combine local tunnel flying with local skydiving to make fast progress."

His bigway fun, as with the P3 PowerPlay in 2009 and the AZ Challenge of 2011, has been on a hold since the 4way commitments take all the time. The same counts for wingsuit jumps where he has made a total of 150. His highlight in this area was a 4way wingsuit flyby of a 10way CRW diamond with Team Ill Vision.

Mikhail Markine believes that FS training carries over to wingsuiting extremely well: "I encourage everyone with aspirations of doing wingsuit formation skydiving to do more RW jumps. Learning to track is only a piece of the puzzle."

He will now get as much FS 4way training as he can imagine and aspire. He has made it to the top level in 4way competition and has to go full time to become a 4way world champion. And that is still SDC Rhythm XP's goal...