posted May 25th, 2015 - The coverage of last weekend's events begins with the Southern Skydiving League.

SSL Director Brandy Verhalen invited 4-way teams and competitors in her region to visit Gold Coast Skydivers, and five teams attended the 2015 season opener.

Three teams competed in the AA Class, where SSL winner Platinum kept up with the British teams in the same category on the overall leaderboard.

Three Platinum members came back from last year's 4-way season (Don Hurd, Eric Mixon, Bill) with a new Point (Nicole Cronin) and David Price on camera.

Platinum trains at Skydive Alabama where the last meet of the 2015 season will be held.

May 23rd, 2015			Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Round 6	Total	Avg
Rank	AA Class		19,N,K	2,O,7	14,J,E	L,6,F	9,18	A,13,1	Total	Avg
1	Platinum	SSL	8	11	6	10	9	8	52	8.7
2	Southern Mix	SSL	9	5	5	6	3	4	32	5.3
3	GC4	SSL	4	6	4	8	0	3	25	4.2
Rank	Rookie		N,G,P	O,Q,C	J,E,K	L,M,B	H,N,O	A,F,D	Total	Avg
1	Fire Breathing Rubber Duckies	SSL	7	7	8	13	8	9	52	8.7
2	Instructions by Will	SSL	1	0	1	0	2	2	6	1.0

GC4 tried to defend the home turf of the Gold Coast Skydivers in the AA Class with Luis Hawkins, Kara Pylant, Craig Saucier, Davis Hall and Tony Cascino on camera.

Three of this year's team members (Luis Hawkins, Craig Saucier, Davis Hall) competed for the Gold Coast Skydivers under Not Since AFF last year.

Southern Mix was a new team whose members have been working on advancing their skills with intensive indoor training.

Jimmy Xu has also attended a few Indoor Cloud League events for iFLY Orlando's Florida group. The names of the ambitious and passionate new 4-way competitors will most likely appear regularly on future NSL leaderboards.

Two teams competed in the Rookie Class, and one SSL team also managed to keep up with the strong UK teams in this category. The Fire Breathing Rubber Duckies (FBRD) competed with three of the same team members (Stephen Addision, Chris Webb, Samuel Yates) for Gear Check last year.

Jeremy Rice is the new Point, and Caitlin O'Malley was filming the team last weekend. FBRD plans to take on the Florida Rookie Class teams at the NSL Championship this year.

Instructions Provided by Will also had an SSL presence last year. Instructions Not Included had attended two SSL meets and the NSL Championship in 2014. Will Miller is guiding a new lineup this year and was facing a personnel change at the last minute.

The team switched slots throughout the whole day to find the best combination for exits and to accommodate a very new 4-way competitor.

Christopher Rhoden made his first tandem jump on May 31st last year, which was the day of the SSL season opener at Skydive Alabama:

"I remember thinking what can be so fun about groups jumping in the air, and also thinking what am I doing, before going up and getting out. After that day I realized I wanted to jump, and this weekend I realized why it’s so much fun and why they were excited that day. I got a taste of it in the tunnel, but nothing like this past weekend. Believe you definitely have me hooked with it."

Christopher Rhoden now has 49 skydives and went to a tunnel camp with coach Scott Latinis before finishing his A license last fall.

SSL Director Brandy Verhalen was just as excited for her new 4-way competitor as he was:

"Those are the kinds of things that make all of this worth it."

She got her own share of meet fun when several SSL competitors decided to add a few more jumps to the 6-round competition at the end of the day.

Brandy Verhalen and judge Kurt Gaebel joined the group for a 10-way fun jump, organized by Platinum's team captain Don Hurd. The next SSL meet is scheduled for July 11th at Chattanooga Skydiving Company.