posted Sep 8th, 2017 - The meet videos of a very successful national delegation in Formation Skydiving at the FAI World Cup 2017 has still been missing. The NSL News is catching up now, starting with the Russian national team in 4-way Open, Black Cat, and Tanay, Russia's national 8-way team.

In fact, Russia was the only delegation that took home medals in all four Formation Skydiving events (4-way Open, 4-way Women, 4-way VFS, 8-way Open). Tanay (8-way silver), Bubble Trouble (4-way Women bronze) and Vertical Flystation (VFS bronze) won FAI World Cup medals, and Black Cat added a bronze medal for the 3rd place in the European Championships, which was a separate part of the FAI World Cup.

France won medals in three events (gold in 4-way Women, silver in 4-way Open, European bronze in 8-way) and did not have a VFS team in Saarlouis. The U.S. delegation won gold and silver in VFS, gold in 8-way, bronze in 4-way Open and missed the 4-way Women event.

The NSL News invited members of the Russian delegation for a live NSL Talk before the award ceremony, and interpreter Denis Sviridoff made sure that the Russian part of the conversation can also be understood by the English-speaking audience.

FAI World Cup 2017			1	2	3	4	(5)	Total	Avg
Rank	4-way Open - Top 10		L,O,F,K,11	C,3,7	13,2,G	1,17,20	(5,E,21)	Total	Avg
1	NMP PCH HayaBusa	BE	35	26	21	20	(28)	102	25.5
2	RealFly-Sion	FR	35	26	20	20	(23)	101	25.3
3	SDC Rhythm XP	US	33	24	20	16	(-)	93	23.3
4	Black Cat	RU	26	24	17	18	(24)	85	21.3
5	bUSA Defiance	US	26	22	16	17	(19)	81	20.3

FAI World Cup 2017			1	2	3	Total	Avg
Rank	AAA Class		L,O,F,K,11	C,3,7	13,2,G	Total	Avg
1	Golden Knights	US	24	24	18	66	22.0
2	Tanay	RU	22	20	17	59	19.7
3	Fly-In Machine 44	BE	19	20	14	53	17.7
4	VR8 France	FR	17	19	11	47	15.7
5	Project: Ride the Dragon	UK	6	9	8	23	7.7
6	Awkward Turtles	UK	7	8	4	19	6.3

The conversation began with a review of the Black Cat history by team videographer Vadim Niyazov, who is also the Vice President of the Russian skydiving federation. He explained that Black Cat's team project started at the same time when NMP PCH HayaBusa put the first lineup together, 15 years ago.

Both teams still have original team members in the lineup, David and Andy Grauwels for the Belgian 4-way world champions, Vasily Korotkov, Evgeny Stashchenko, Alexander Kvochur and videographer Vadim Niyazov for the Russian world class team. The Belgian Grauwels brothers will try to win their third 4-way gold medal next year, while Black Cat is aiming at medals in 4-way and 8-way.

Black Cat needed an alternate in Saarlouis, as original member Evgeny Stashchenko is still recovering from a knee surgery. New 8-way member Vladimir Pavlenko, who has won two 4-way bronze medals and 8-way gold for Russia in the past, was helping out without much training. The total of 10 point deductions in the four official meet rounds kept Black Cat from finishing closer to the world cup medal positions.

Black Cat is still a part of the Russian 8-way team Tanay, as well, which is headed by the President of the Russian skydiving federation, Andrey Barabash.

Tanay finished with the team's highest meet average after the three meet rounds and missed the 20-point benchmark only due to one point deduction in Round 2.

Russian 8-way teams have posted higher averages only twice at world meets.

Tanay and Black Cat members Vasily Korotkov, Evgeny Stashchenko and Vladimir Pavlenko were in the 1999 lineup that posted a 20.9 average at the world meet in Australia.

The record number is one of the targets for the Tanay team. Russia also won 8-way gold medals with a 20.2 average in Gap 2003.

Tanay alternate Alexey Minaev, who stepped in for Evgeny Stashchenko in Saarlouis, was in the 1999 and 2003 lineups, too.

Olga Bykova represented the Russian national team in 4-way Women, Bubble Trouble, at the NSL Live Talk. The team's 18.2 after the five meet rounds in 4-way Women is a new Russian record average, and Bubble Trouble confirmed the position of a serious medal contender for Australia 2018 in Saarlouis.