posted Jan 10th, 2010 - The scores for Round 3 are posted, and the same four teams are still in the same race for the money positions. However, some things have already changed. There are actually two different races now, one for the 1st place between Arizona Airspeed and Hayabusa Defence, and the other one between France Aerodyne Cypres Maubeuge and Canada Evolution.

This is not a big surprise, as the NSL News mentioned already earlier. France is missing Point Mathieu Bernier, and it would turn the skydiving logic upside down if such a well trained team could perform on the same level with an alternate, even if the substitute Point is a former 4-way world champion and high-profile coach.

CYPRES rep Rob "Dutch" Kendall uploaded two videos of the French national 4-way team with Point Marin Ferre to YouTube. The video of Round 1 has been added to the NSL News story on 9 January 2010. Round 2 is embedded below.

It is still a surprise how the Canadian team Evolution performs in Dubai. It was a very slow 2009 season for the LeMay family and went by with only one competition for Evolution, the Canadian Nationals 2009. Now the team is in 3rd place after three rounds and competes with France for the $10,000 cash.

The NSL News has no details of the actual scores and potential point deductions in Round 3 and will follow up as soon as this information is available. Fact is that Hayabusa outscored Airspeed by two points and is only one point behind the world champions.

Airspeed knew before the scores were posted that Round 3 had an open end, as the short note on Airspeed's Facebook Blog mentioned: "We had a good jump with a bit of a slow start. We'll have to see how it turns out."

Hayabusa Defence's Video of Round 3 above

It turned out that Airspeed gave up two points to Hayabusa in Round 3. Losing a round is nothing new to the world champions. In fact, Hayabusa has beat Airspeed in a round several times in the last two years, the first time with Luc Verstrepen at the World Challenge 2008, then in four of the eight rounds at the World Meet 2008 in France.

The new Hayabusa Defence lineup with Waedong So in the Point slot competed with Airspeed only once in 2009, at the World Challenge in Bedford. The new Belgian lineup won two rounds over the 4-way world champions of 2008. The competition in Dubai is the first outdoor meet where the new lineup now won a round over their main contender this year.

Airspeed knows how to deal with this situation and has shown several times that only the final results after all rounds eventually count. Once again, the reigning world champion is the only team in Dubai that has not scored below 20 so far. Round 7 of the Shamrock Showdown 2009 was the last time that Airspeed scored below 20. And the world champions have never lost a meet yet...

Dubai Championship
Who will win the 4-way Open Class?	Arizona Airspeed Hayabusa Defence Canada Evolution France Aerodyne Cypres Maubeuge
	Current Results