posted Sep 11th, 2013 - The Russian Nationals 2013 took place in Kolomna, while the ESL Championship 2013 was held in Moorsele last week.

Both events applied the same competition draw in the AAA Class, and the overall leaderboard is showing how many strong Russian teams there are. Only one ESL team made it into the Top 10, and it was the unofficial amateur world champion of 2012, Thunder.

The Russian Nationals were bothered by very bad weather, and the teams were lucky to complete the three rounds on the last meet day. Thunder completed eight rounds in Moorsele. Fly Station also finished ahead of Thunder by winning Round 2 clearly. The Sun Path Products NSL News had covered the Russian top team's attempt to compete at the World Cup 2013 with the story on 20 August 2013.
Click on the score for a round with a link to see the teams' videos

September 7th, 2013		Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class	15,H,16	17,5,7	K,Q,P,22	Total	Avg
1	Barkli (RU)	23	29	29	81	27.0
2	Fly Station (RU)	21	27	24	72	24.0
3	Thunder (BE)	21	22	24	67	22.3
4	Sunny Wind (RU)	17	20	21	58	19.3
5	U4 (RU)	16	19	19	54	18.0
5	Sky 45 (RU)	16	19	19	54	18.0
7	XOteam (RU)	15	17	18	50	16.7
8	a.team4way (RU)	14	19	16	49	16.3
9	Black Cat (RU)	13	16	16	45	15.0
10	2XL (RU)	13	16	15	44	14.7

Barkli Round 3	Thunder Round 3

Sunny Wind, a.team4way and Infra Red Band had also competed for Russia at the World Cup in Banja Luka and now attended last week's 3-round competition. Sunny Wind won the Russian bronze medals after consistently improving the team's scoring level (14.2 - 17.4 - 19.3) this year.

National 4way team Barkli was once again performing on world class level and continued with an impressive scoring streak that has not been mentioned yet. Round 3 at the Russian Nationals was the team's 13th consecutive round with scores of only 20-pointers and higher.

The ten Barkli rounds at the World Cup were the entry ticket to the 4way elite club of teams who have gone through a 10-round meet without scoring below 20 points for a round. Only five teams were club members until the World Cup 2013: DeLand Majik, Fastrax, Arizona Airspeed, Aerodyne Maubeuge and NMP-PCH Hayabusa. Barkli has now won the 6th membership.
Click on the score for a round with a link to see the teams' videos

World Cup 2013		Rd. 1	Rd. 2	Rd. 3	Rd. 4	Rd. 5	Rd. 6	Rd. 7	Rd. 8	Rd. 9	Rd. 10	Total	Avg
Rank	4way Open	O,4,H,3	9,17,P	L,1,G,12	7,10,21	16,E,A,15	8,2,B	18,5,Q	F,14,K,N	M,C,D,13	20,J,19	Total	Avg
1	NMP-PCH Hayabusa (BE)	27	33	23	22	29	22(-2)	26	28	33(-1)	24	267	26.7
2	Barkli (RU)	26	31	21	20	22(-3)	21	24(-1)	25(-1)	26(-3)	21	237	23.7
3	Maubeuge Aerodyne (FR)	22	28	20	20	23	16(-1)	21	22(-2)	28	21	221	22.1

The standard has gone up up in the meantime, even though it is still very difficult for even the best teams to score 20 or higher for a slow 3-block sequence. The sequence for Round 4 (7,10,21) was the slowest one in Banja Luka and also included memory for the front piece.

Round 4 was also where NMP-PCH Hayabusa quietly joined the even smaller 22-pointer club. Only France and Airspeed's 2012 lineup did the same before Hayabusa now mastered this challenge and made it a 3-team membership.

Barkli confirmed the team's great form at the Russian Nationals. The sequence of Round 8 (6,10,12) would have brought the next big challenge for the best Russian team in 4way history. It is probably slower than the one for the 20-pointer in Banja Luka. Arizona Airspeed is next to be challenged with a 10-round draw at the upcoming USPA Nationals 2013.