posted Nov 7th, 2017 - The 4-way juniors have been making the NSL News headlines frequently for a while, and this will not change much in the future. It is only related to indoor competition so far, with the exception of Canadian 4-way junior Yannick Bisson.

The NSL News now turns to the 4-way seniors who do not have their own 4-way category, even though there is a SOS (Skydivers Over Sixty) world championship that includes a 4-way competition on the Rookie Class rules level.

There are adult 4-way competitors who exclusively attend indoor meets. Some of them continue that way after the end of their outdoor career, while others join the 4-way world with no intention to ever jump from a plane. However, the vast majority of senior 4-way competitors are active at indoor and outdoor events both.

Scott Latinis from Texas is a 4-way senior and qualifies officially even for the SOS community. He is not only active at indoor and outdoor 4-way events but also participates in almost any skydiving discipline. He is one of the most passionate Formation Skydiving competitors who sign up for all four events during the belly-flying week at the USPA Nationals (4 - 8 - 10 - 16).

USPA Nationals 2017			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	4-way Open		O,4,9	G,21,A,H	N,D,J,14	L,16,12	K,19,6	E,2,10	P,11,15	17,3,22	F,7,1	Q,5,M,20	Total	Avg
1	NMP PCH HayaBusa	BE	31	33	28	23	25	23	23	22	31	31	270	27.0
2	Arizona Airspeed	US	27	32	29	22	24	22	21	23	29	29	258	25.8
3	SDC Rhythm XP	US	29	31	28	23	22	20	23	19	28	29	252	25.2
4	Golden Knights	US	24	26	28	22	18	19	20	19	24	23	223	22.3
5	Airspeed Odyssey	US	25	23	27	19	22	19	19	17	23	23	217	21.7
6	Defiance	US	24	24	26	18	19	17	19	16	24	22	209	20.9
7	GKBC	US	24	19	24	15	17	17	18	16	23	20	193	19.3
8	Dallas 350	US	18	23	24	16	16	16	16	11	22	19	181	18.1
9	ISR FireFlash	BE	21	22	19	14	17	16	14	16	20	19	178	17.8
10	SDMW NEXT XP	US	15	25	17	17	15	16	16	15	23	14	173	17.3
11	Spaceland Lite	US	19	22	19	12	17	14	13	8	19	17	160	16.0
12	Phoenix XP	US	16	18	19	13	13	13	14	14	15	17	152	15.2
13	Long Shot	US	16	14	15	13	13	14	12	12	16	17	142	14.2
14	Arizona Alpha	US	17	17	11	12	14	13	12	13	17	12	138	13.8
15	Perris Quicksilver	US	15	17	12	11	11	13	12	10	16	13	130	13.0

USPA Nationals 2017			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	8-way Open		G,22,1	9,6,2	D,7,17	8,J,C,K	Q,B,14,20	19,15,4	A,10,13	12,M,N,P	H,O,3,16	5,21,11	Total	Avg
1	Golden Knights	US	22	17	16	19	21	22	19	21	28	17	202	20.2
G	Fly-In Machine 44	BE	23	16	17	16	15	21	16	20	26	15	185	18.5
G	Qatar Falcons	QA	16	12	15	12	15	16	13	17	20	13	149	14.9
2	Arizona Airspeed	US	17	14	11	15	15	17	14	13	18	13	147	14.7
G	Amphibious Attack Tigers	US	18	12	13	10	13	18	14	16	15	11	140	14.0
6	SDC Rhythm XP8	US	12	11	12	13	11	15	12	15	14	12	127	12.7
7	Paraclete XP8	US	13	11	10	11	12	14	12	11	14	10	118	11.8
8	Spaceland Gummies 8	US	11	11	8	7	10	12	9	10	10	9	97	9.7
G	Perris Spider Pigs	US	5	7	4	5	6	5	7	5	4	7	55	5.5

This year was even more special for Scott Latinis, as he became the first and only SOS competitor who won a USPA gold medal with 60 years of age.

He started off the Formation Skydiving week in Perris with 4-way Open Class team Long Shot. The NSL News reported on 4 October 2017 how the lineup came together.

Then he continued with ten more rounds in 8-way Open with a better trained team, as several Amphibious Attack Tigers have known each other from earlier events over the years, with little training and then the 8-way competition at the USPA Nationals.

This year's 8-way lineup included Eliana Rodriguez and Craig Girard, which made the AA Tigers a guest team. However, all team members were happy and excited to share ten 8-way rounds with the former Airspeed 4-way and 8-way world champions.

The AA Tigers won their first set of USPA 8-way medals last year with a 3rd place behind Golden Knights and Airspeed.

This year, they finished only seven points behind the USPA silver medals and gave Airspeed a serious competition, even though they could not place in the medal rankings as a guest team.

USPA Nationals 2017		1	2	3	4	5	6	Total	Avg
Rank	10way Speed
1	Arizona Airspeed	16.62	11.97	13.49	10.18	12.34	14.72	79.32	13.22
2	Golden Knights	35.00	15.27	11.59	12.58	13.08	12.02	99.54	16.59
3	Rhinoceros Kisses and Dirty Di	16.51	18.13	17.51	17.11	22.73	15.54	107.53	17.92

USPA Nationals 2017		1	2	3	4	5	6	Total	Avg
Rank	16-way	5,7	12,C	H,10	8,F	11,E	2,G	Total	Avg
1	GKXP	9	10	11	7	13	6	56	9.3
2	Arizona Airspeed	6	6	9	6	11	6	44	7.3
3	Lite 350 Monster Mash	5	5	4	5	7	4	30	5.0
4	Deguello 17	4	3	6	4	7	5	29	4.8
5	Dallas Disturbance	5	3	5	2	9	3	27	4.5
6	Perris Teamsters Union	3	3	4	4	4	3	21	3.5
7	Blocksmixteen	3	1	3	2	1	2	12	2.0

Next event was the 16-way competition where Scott Latinis had his slot in the Airspeed lineup, together with two of his Long Shot team mates (Rodney Cruce, Tim King) and four AA Tigers (Brian Stephens, Ben Liston, Nick Grillet, James "Bu" Klinge).

The Airspeed 16-way team could not keep up with the strong Golden Knights XP lineup and finished 2nd. However, the gold medal event for Scott Latinis came best and last with the 10-way Speed competition.

Once again, Scott Latinis was selected for the Airspeed team, together with Long Shot team mate Rodney Cruce and the same four AA Tigers.

The complete Airspeed 4-way team was in the 10-way lineup, and the Golden Knights were not able to stop SOS competitor Scott Latinis from winning his gold medal of the week - with or without the U.S. Army team's 35-second score in Round 1.

It is difficult to imagine USPA Nationals without Scott Latinis, and it would be no big surprise to still see him compete for USPA medals in ten years as a SO70 competitor (Skydiver Over Seventy)...