posted Jun 9th, 2006 - The NSL News mentioned during the meet report from Denmark on June 8 that the Scandinavian neighbour country Sweden will be covered next. Another NSL News story on May 17 had already included the great news that Sweden will join the international league network together with France for the 2006 season.

The first competition of the Coupe de France 2006 was already covered in length with the NSL News story on June 7 and included impressive scores by the French national 4-way team in the female category and the French 8-way team. Sweden competed on the same weekend together with France and has also a similar schedule with three meets in the summer.

Lennart Vestbom, the league organizer in Sweden, provided the meet information after the successful conclusion of the first event. His efforts to run the league events in Sweden are supported by the national coach and former member of Swedish national 4-way teams, Mattias Nord.

Team Spaï, of the skydiving club Cirrus-Göteborg, took the first place quite easily with 13.3 meet average after six rounds. It was the first competition for the team this year. Mats Svensson, a former member of the Swedish top team Velox, replaced Lena Erlandsson for the 2006 season.

Lena Erlandsson had won a 4-way bronze medal with the Swedish female team at the World Meet 2001 in Spain. Team Spaï scored a 16-pointer in the 3rd round at beat Sweet4 from Stockholm by a total of 14 points. The real competition for Team Spaï was not present at the first meet and will offer a serious contest at the next meet.

Team Spaï is one of the two Swedish teams that are competing to represent Sweden at the World Meet 2006 in Germany. The other team is Team 42, of the Skåne FK club, which couldn't join the meet this time since one team member was working abroad. Lennart Vestbom commented that this competition is very exciting: "We are looking forward to see what will happen at the second Swedish Cup event on June 17 - 18 in Västerås."

The Swedish association has obviously not decided yet which team will compete in Germany. Team 42 had a great showing at a recent tunnel competition in the United Kingdom and will offer strong competition. The 42 line-up with Johnny Olsson, Joar Stenquist, Jens Thogersen and Andreas Wittbom was the national team last year and competed at the FSL Shamrock Showdown 2005. Team 42 finished with a 12.7 average at the March meet in DeLand.

The 2006 line-up consists of Mattias Pålsson, Joar Stenkvist, Jens Thögersen and Andreas Wittbom, with Staffan Linde on camera. Mattias Pålsson has replaced Johnny Olsson. The results at the second meet of the Swedish Cup on June 17 - 18 will give the Swedish association more information for the decision who will travel to Germany in August.

The Tigers from the Arctic Circle Skydivers in Finland took the third place in the AAA/Open Class competition in Sweden. The Tigers will be training for two weeks at the Swedish Basic Camp in Gryttjom. The organizors of the camp have hired world class coaches, including former DeLand Norgies member Lise Nansen-Aune, reigning DeLand Majik 4-way world champions Joey Jones and Dough Park, Kenneth Eriksson and Mattias Nord. The Tigers plan to compete at both the Swedish and the Danish national championships in July.

The two teams that competed in the A Class last weekend, Fabulous 4 and AirGangBang, raced each other and competed with Chasing Amy of the Midwest Skydiving League, as well. All three teams finished within two points after six rounds. It was a local showdown between the Swedish teams who are training at the same drop zone, and Fabulous 4 kept the upper hand.