posted Jul 11th, 2026 - The FAI Outdoor World Championship 2026 marks the third time since 1985 that Skydive Arizona has hosted the world's premier formation skydiving event. The first occasion came more than three decades ago, when the French national team in 4-way Open captured its fourth consecutive world championship title in Eloy in 1993.

The United States was represented by DeLand Vertical Air, and the 1993 world championship became the catalyst for one of the most significant developments in the history of U.S. 4-way competition. Following the event, the top competitors from the East and West Coasts combined forces to create the original Arizona Airspeed lineup with Dan BC, Jack Jefferies, Mark Kirkby and Kirk Verner, while John Lemming joined the team as videographer. Skydive Arizona won the bid to host the new team over Skydive DeLand, and only two years later the original Arizona Airspeed lineup earned the first 4-way Open world championship title for the United States at the 1995 event in Lucenec, Czechoslovakia.

The 1993 world championship in Eloy also introduced a milestone in the evolution of formation skydiving competition. It was the first FAI outdoor world championship where both 4-way and 8-way teams were judged with air-to-air video footage. As the NSL News reported on January 13th, the new judging system had been developed over several years, tested successfully at the 1992 Outdoor World Cup, and then implemented permanently at the 1993 world championship. From that point on, judging with binoculars and ground-to-air video recordings became part of the sport's history, while team videographers became an integral component of every competition team.

FAI Outdoor World Championship 1993			1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	Total	Avg
Rank	4-way Open		TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD	Total	Avg
1	France	FR	19	16	20	17	21	21	18	18	21	19	190	19.0
2	DeLand Vertical Air	US	20	18	18	16	21	19	15	15	21	19	182	18.2
3	Team DK	DK	18	16	18	11	19	19	13	16	21	18	169	16.9
4	Finland	FI	14	13	16	15	17	17	13	13	17	14	149	14.9
5	Sweden	SE	16	13	17	12	14	18	12	13	17	16	148	14.8
6	Germany	DE	15	13	14	13	16	17	13	13	16	15	145	14.5
7	Russia	RU	17	15	13	15	11	17	13	16	19	8	144	14.4
7	Endeavour	CH	16	14	14	12	15	14	11	15	17	16	144	14.4
9	Japan	JP	15	13	16	10	15	15	12	14	15	-	125	13.9
10	Austria	AT	14	13	14	11	15	14	13	13	17	-	124	13.8
11	South Africa	ZA	14	14	15	13	14	13	11	13	16	-	123	13.7
12	Great Britain	UK	14	10	14	13	14	12	12	13	18	-	120	13.3
12	Belgium	BE	11	12	14	12	15	15	12	15	14	-	120	13.3
14	Italy	IT	14	10	14	13	15	15	10	13	14	-	118	13.1
15	Australia	AU	13	11	12	13	14	13	12	13	12	-	113	12.6
16	New Zealand	NZ	13	10	12	8	13	12	12	13	-	-	93	11.6
16	Canada	CA	11	11	13	11	14	12	10	11	-	-	93	11.6
18	Norway	NO	13	5	12	9	14	13	10	12	-	-	88	11.0
19	Spain	ES	12	9	12	11	11	13	10	8	-	-	86	10.8
20	Netherlands	NL	10	9	10	8	10	10	9	10	-	-	76	9.5
21	Icelandair	IS	11	10	6	9	10	11	8	9	-	-	74	9.3
22	Croatia	HR	9	9	9	9	11	9	6	11	-	-	73	9.1
23	Hungary	HU	9	7	8	5	6	9	8	6	-	-	58	7.3
24	Israel	IL	7	0	4	2	7	7	6	5	-	-	38	4.8
25	Indonesia	ID	5	3	4	5	3	8	5	4	-	-	37	4.6
26	Ireland	IE	5	6	4	3	1	5	5	5	-	-	34	4.3
27	Latvia	LV	2	1	2	6	6	6	5	5	-	-	33	4.1
28	Turkey	TR	4	4	4	4	4	5	3	2	-	-	30	3.8
29	Taiwan	TW	1	1	2	1	0	1	1	0	-	-	7	0.9

Arizona Airspeed lineups have added five more outdoor world championship titles (2001, 2008, 2012, 2022 and 2024) since the original team, which won in 1995 and 1997, retired from competition. That brings the Airspeed total to seven FAI outdoor world championship gold medals, the most recent at Crystal Coast 2024. The same lineup had already claimed the title in Eloy 2022, with Alex Swindle succeeding Brendan Haddon as team videographer.

The 2022 world championship, also hosted by Skydive Arizona on Airspeed's home turf, produced one of the most dominant performances in the history of the discipline. It was the first time since the introduction of the current world championship format in 1985 that a 4-way Open team won all ten competition rounds without allowing any other team to equal its score in a single round. The 33-point margin over second-place NMP PCH HayaBusa was likewise unprecedented in FAI formation skydiving competition during the same period.

It was not the first occasion that a 4-way Open team dominated a world championship in similar fashion. At the Tanay 2021 world championship, Belgium's NMP PCH HayaBusa lineup of 2020/2021, with Michele Silvi at Inside Center and David Grauwels on camera, also won every competition round without conceding a tie. Their 24-point advantage over runner-up SDC Rhythm XP might well have grown to the 33-point margin achieved by Airspeed in 2022. However, persistent bad weather forced the competition to end after only six rounds.

FAI Outdoor World Meet 2022			1		2		3		4		5		6		7		8		9		10		Total	Avg
Rank	4-way Open		20,16,B		P,D,21,13		17,K,11		E,A,19,22		2,9,M		C,14,F,12		3,6,18		4,10,1		8,Q,O,H		5,7,J		Total	Avg
1	Arizona Airspeed	US	21	-1	28		27		27		31		23		21		20		32		31		261	26.1
2	NMP-PCH Hayabusa	BE	20	-1	25	-2	21		23		28		20	-2	19		17		29		26		228	22.8
3	Qatar Tigers	QA	19	-2	23	-1	22	-1	21	-1	26		18		17	-1	17		28		28		219	21.9
4	France 4-way Open	FR	19		23	-1	22		23		27		20	-1	18		15	-1	20	-5	27	-1	214	21.4
5	Chimera	UK	16		21	-2	19		19	-1	18	-5	18	-1	16		14	-1	23	-1	24		188	18.8
6	Papea Masculino	ES	17	-1	20	-1	18	-1	21		21	-2	18		15		15		21	-1	20	-3	186	18.6
7	Echochamber Oceanside	SE	14	-1	21		19		19		20	-1	17		16		15		24	-1	20	-1	185	18.5
8	Airbus Oceanside Illertissen	DE	16		18	-2	19		16	-1	20	-1	13	-3	15		14		19	-2	22	-1	172	17.2
9	Agera FS 2022	NO	16		16	-2	17	-1	17		18	-1	15		15		13	-1	18	-3	21		166	16.6
9	4Astrophe	CA	15	-1	20		19		15	-2	21		15		15	-2	14		16	-3	16	-2	166	16.6
11	Out of the Blue	NL	16		16	-3	17		17		14	-2	17		12	-1	13	-1	21	-1	18		161	16.1
12	Ripper	AU	14	-1	16	-1	18		16	-1	21		15		12		10	-3	19	-1	19	-1	160	16.0
13	Sky4Four	PL	13	-1	14	-3	14		16		16	-2	12	-1	12		13		21		18	-1	149	14.9
14	HF Flying Circus	CZ	13		10	-7	16		15	-1	18	-2	12	-1	13		11	-3	16	-5	17	-1	141	14.1
15	Sequenz	DK	10	-2	16		15		14	-1	17	-1	12	-1	12		11	-1	17	-1	11	-3	135	13.5
16	INIT-Y	BR	12	-2	14	-1	14	-1	13	-4	16		11	-2	10	-3	12		17	-1	15	-3	134	13.4
17	HSV Red Bull Aerodynamix	AT	10	-2	16		14		15		15	-1	8	-3	9	-2	10	-1	15	-1	13	-1	125	12.5
18	Adventure Flyers	PY	9	-1	13		12	-1	11		16		11		10		9		14		14	-1	119	11.9
19	Equinox	LT	10	-1	12	-2	12		12	-1	13	-1	10		10		9	-1	12	-4	14	-1	114	11.4
20	Tina & The Dinosaurs	NZ	5		8	-1	4		9		9	-1	8		5		4	-2	10		8		70	7.0
21	La Playa	GT	2	-1	7	-2	5	-1	3	-3	7		5		3	-1	5		-		-		37	4.6

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Most dominating performance: Arizona Airspeed in Eloy 2022

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The third outdoor world championship at Skydive Arizona bears some resemblance to the first one in 1993. There was no home team from Arizona competing for the U.S. delegation in Eloy that year, and France captured the 4-way Open Class gold medals. Nearly three decades later, Arizona Airspeed dominated the field on home turf in Eloy 2022 and successfully defended the world title two years later at Crystal Coast 2024.

This year, however, the new Arizona Airspeed lineup will once again not represent the United States at the world championship in Eloy. The original Airspeed team, formed in 1994, was not yet in existence when the 1993 world championship took place, and in several later seasons other U.S. teams earned the national slot instead. Most recently, SDC Rhythm XP won the USPA Nationals 2019 and represented the United States at the world championship in Russia in August 2021.

Arizona Airspeed then reclaimed the USPA 4-way Open Class title and won every national championship from 2021 through 2024. That streak ended when the new Airspeed lineup was defeated by the Golden Knights at the USPA Nationals 2025. As a result, Airspeed will not compete at the world championship on its home drop zone in October. Four years after the most dominant performance in modern world championship history at Eloy 2022, the battle for the FAI gold medals will take place without the home team. Only Niklas Hamlin, still a reigning 4-way world champion from the 2022 and 2024 Airspeed lineup, returns to Eloy as coach of the Golden Knights. Once again, as in 1993, a French 4-way Open team may stand in the way of another U.S. world championship title.

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Most dominating performance: NMP PCH HayaBusa in Tanay 2021

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