posted Apr 26th, 2006 - The scoreboard of last weekend's events in Texas and Carolina is now complete.

16 teams competed in three competition classes, and the AA/Intermediate Class was the most popular one with a total of nine teams.

Three teams of the Texas Skydiving League had the whole AAA/Open Class for themselves, and Dallas Thunder won with a 15.5 meet average.

The Golden Knights had the CASL competition in Raeford on the team schedule, as team captain Brian Krause explained in his interview with the NSL News on February 21: "There is a good chance that we will once again compete at the FSL Shamrock Showdown 2006. We will not stop competing after that event as we did last year. We plan to attend each of the five Carolina Skydiving League meets."

The interview took place during the SSL Valentine's Meet 2006 in Eloy, when Brian Kause and team videographer Larry Miller drove hours to visit the event in Eloy that they had originally planned to attend as competitors. The Golden Knights had to cancel the trip to Florida in March, as well, when they had to help out for the Army's short-handed demo team.

This time, missing the Carolina Skydiving League 2006 season opener was caused by an injury shortly before the meet. Brian Krause once again informed the NSL News with the sad news ahead of time:

"Sorry to inform that we are not going to make it to the first CASL competition. Matt Davidson is injured. We were lifting weights and a 45-pound plate fell on Matt's foot. It crushed the end of his toe, and the doctors had to remove about 1/4 inch of bone. Hopefully, we will be jumping in about two weeks. We were making very good progress, and I am sorry we will not be able to compete."

The Golden Knights will be back, no doubt, and Brian Krause promised to update the NSL News when they will be back in action. Last weekend, the AAA/Open Class competition had to take place without the Golden Knights representing the Carolina Skydiving League in Raeford.

Meet Report by CASL Director Randy Garman

The first meet of the 2006 CaSL season opened with a low ceiling, a 90% chance of rain, and afternoon winds were predicted to be gusting up to 30 knots. The meet was postponed until Sunday immediately after the pilot gave the day's forecast at the competitors briefing.

The Sunday morning was clear and calm with eight teams competing at this meet, four in the Rookie Class and four in the AA/Intermediate Class. The CASL competition should be interesting this year. This was the first meet since the start of the CASL that there was no established team returning in any of the competition classes.

Last year's league champions, who were also the winners of the Intermediate Class silver medals at the USPA Nationals 2005, Carolina Ice, has moved up to the AAA/Advanced Class competition. Ice was not at this meet due to an injury, and we hope to see them at the next meet.

Competition rule #157, it ain’t over until it’s over!

After round six, the Furious Foxes and Crazy Ivan and the Crew were tied with a raw score of 49 points. Crazy Ivan and the Crew had to forfeit the jump-off round because one or more of the team had started to celebrate before learning their final score.

CASL Director Randy Garman had Rhonda Roper and Keith Walter on his side as the event judges.

The AA/Intermediate Class competition was a tight race between the the teams from Texas and Carolina. TSL Team America, the Rookie Class NSL champion of 2005, skipped the A Class and took the first place of the nine AA Class teams at the first meet of the 2006 season, with a 1-point advantage over the two CASL teams.

The next TSL team, Dallas Avalanche, was only two points behind the Furious Foxes and Crazy Ivan and the Crew. The whole 9-team ranking of last weekend's AA Class competition is a regular exchange between teams from Texas and Carolina. More team information and a meet report from Texas will follow soon.