posted Aug 9th, 2005 - The NSL News has currently been on a west coast roll. There were a lot of Southwest Skydiving League competition jumps on NSL-TV, teams were introduced, and the last NSL News story mentioned that the current situation in the AA Class competition deserves special attention, as well. SSL teams Arizona Divewerkz and Elsinore Equinox are much involved in this scenario.

The opening of SkyVenture Arizona in Eloy happened to coincide with the NSL west coast swing, and the NSL News used the opportunity for a visit at Skydive Arizona. Action videos and pictures of the new tunnel, interviews with Airspeed members and SkyVenture Arizona staff will be a part of this story to come.

NSL News visits to the west coast will continue in the near future. The NSL News will cover the USPA Nationals 2005 with live coverage from the competition site at Skydive Perris. The World Cup 2005 in October will bring the NSL News back to Eloy.

At this point, the story of the AA Class competition is due before the new SkyVenture wind tunnel in Eloy will be introduced to the NSL audience.

The NSL News detected the most exciting situation in the AA Class competition while posting the results of the NSL SkyVenture Orlando Competition on June 25, which came along with new footage of the same weekend's SSL June meet. It was interesting enough that the three top contenders of the AA Class, Arizona Divewerkz, Carolina Ice and Elsinore Equinox, all competed that weekend.

However, a closer look at each team's 2005 scores and team history provided additional information, which makes the current AA Class situation all the more exciting.

Carolina Ice was already a AA Class top contender throughout the 2004 season. In fact, the CASL team was expected to win medals at the USPA Nationals 2004 after attending six NSL meets with very consistent scores around the 11.o average level. There was only one team in 2004, Kaizen of the Great Lakes Skydiving League, which seemed to be able to give Carolina Ice a race for the USPA Championship in the AA/Intermediate Class.

Tragically, last year's Ice trip to Skydive Perris ended up with a disaster when the CASL team was disqualified and ended up in the last place of the official rankings. Carolina Ice made a mistake by using a videographer who was not registered with the team when Ice videographer Robin Kellum's camera failed to function on the jump run for round nine. Carolina Ice got redemption with the gold medals at the NSL Championship 2004 at Fantasy of Flight.

Carolina Ice moved on with the same line-up for the 2005 season and scored on the same performance level as in 2004 at the first 2005 meets (11.0 - 11.3) of the Carolina Skydiving League. However, the situation became also similar to the 2004 situation when Southwest Skydiving League team Arizona Divewerkz came into the picture with a 12.2 meet average in April.

The SSL team was not just a shooting star. Hard and consistent training had prepared Divewerkz to take the position of a top contender in the AA Class this year. The 10.8 average in May might have given Carolina Ice a little break, however, Arizona Divewerkz came back very strong for the weekend when both teams competed at the same time, the currently featured June 25 meet weekend. The SSL team beat the CASL team by five points after six rounds (12.2 - 11.3) and made a strong statement.

Carolina Ice took it serious and shifted up one gear for the next CASL meet on July 30. The 13.0 meet average after four rounds was the best Ice average in team history, and it won back the current top spot in the national AA Class rankings of the NSL.

However, there is a third team involved in the AA Class business this year that is ready to crash the party. Elsinore Equinox is a well known AA Class team that has competed in the Southwest Skydiving League for years and took the fourth place at the USPA Nationals 2004.

Equinox also won the SSL Grand Prize last year, traveled to Florida for the NSL Championship 2004 in November and won the silver medals at Fantasy of Flight. Equinox still never had a serious shot at gold medals, neither at the USPA Nationals nor at the NSL Championship. That might be different this year.

The Elsinore team did not seem to be ready to make a big move after 8.2 and 9.7 averages at the first two SSL meets of the 2005 season. However, there was progression, as the third 2005 meet in May confirmed with a 10.5 average for Equinox. The SSL May meet saw Equinox also very close to Divewerkz.

Carolina Ice was probably still not very impressed by the Elsinore team at that time. Both teams had competed directly with each other at the NSL Championship 2005 without a serious chance for Equinox, and the Carolina team posted an 11.0 average in May.

Elsinore Equinox came back with the same meet average of 11.0 at the next SSL meet in June, which was still significantly behind the SSL rival from Arizona. The major breakthrough for Equinox came with the July 25 meet, which happened to be a meet weekend for the Carolina Skydiving League, as well. Equinox made already the headline of the NSL News on August 3 after posting a 13.2 meet average on the team's home turf in Elsinore.

This 6-round average was not only better than Carolina Ice's 13.0 average after four rounds on the same weekend. Equinox won three of the four common rounds and tied the Ice score in round three, as well. The Equinox performance at the end of July must have left an impression in the Divewerkz quarters in Arizona, as well.

It does not look as if Equinox could step back, the scoring progression of the 2005 season (8.2 - 9.7 - 10.5 - 11.0 - 13.2) is evidence enough. Arizona Divewerkz and Carolina Ice have to accept and consider the third serious contender for USPA and NSL championship medals in the AA/Intermediate Class.

The NSL AA Class Rankings provide more evidence for the 3-team race. The rankings are based on the best three meet averages of each team. Carolina Ice currently holds the first place (11.8), followed by Arizona Divewerkz (11.7) and Elsinore Equinox (11.6), it cannot be much closer. A third SSL team is shortly behind. Elsinore Alloy with player coach John Hamilton is in fourth position with the team's 11.5 season average.

Two more teams (JFF and Cross Keys) are also past the 11.0 average level. It will be an exciting competition in the AA Class at the remaining major events of the 2005 season (NSL Playoffs 2005, USPA Nationals 2005, NSL Championship 2005). The NSL Playoffs 2005 will be the last opportunity for the AA Class teams this year to go through the whole dive pool in a 10-round meet before the 10-round championship events.