posted Sep 30th, 2009 - The NSL News presented an eye candy to the on-line audience with the story on 17 September 2009. The story included the videos of Arizona Airspeed at the Paraclete Money Meet 2007, France Aerodyne Cypres Maubeuge at the FAI World Cup 2009 and DeLand Majik at the Malevsky Cup 2002. All videos were related to the "20-points-and-up-per-round" topic of the story.

One of the three tops of the leaderboards, with competition draw and scores, was mistaken though. The graphic on top of Airspeed's videos at the Paraclete Money Meet 2007 was actually showing the scores of the Malevsky Cup 2007.

This event received its own special attention later in the same article. The NSL News had realized that there was a 3rd team that was already a 20-point club member before France joined at the World Cup this year. Team Fastrax had finished with a 24.7 average at the Malevsky Cup 2007 and posted only scores between 20 and 43 points.

The NSL News now follows up with the videos of Airspeed and Fastrax at the Malevsky Cup 2007. The top of the leaderboard with competition draw and scores once again introduces the videos, Fastrax is first, Airspeed follows below.

Team Fastrax was the main challenger for the new Airspeed Odyssey lineup in 2007. Fastrax founder John Hart (Tail) had brought his team project from Intermediate Class competition to world class format within a few years. The final lineup in 2007 had Thomas Hughes (Center Inside), Doug Park (Center Outside) and Niklas Hemlin (Point) by his side.

Thomas Hughes had replaced Mark Kirkby at the end of the 2006 season, who went back to Arizona and joined the new Airspeed lineup with his old friend and former team mate Craig Girard.

The new Fastrax lineup had opened the 2007 season with a very strong message to Arizona at the World Challenge 2007 indoor competition in Bedford. Airspeed just carried a 1-point advantage (280 - 279) over the finish line after ten rounds in April. Fastrax had a 1-point lead going into Round 10, and Airspeed pulled it out in the last minute.

It was obviously no surprise that Fastrax was ready to challenge Airspeed the whole year. However, Fastrax did extremely well at the following outdoor competitions, as the 20-point performance in Russia in early July shows, and still could never again get as close to Airspeed as in Bedford.

Fastrax did not follow Airspeed's trail to the Paraclete Money Meet later the same month. Airspeed still had to work just as hard in Raeford as earlier in Bedford to win by one single point, this time over the 1305.

All three teams then met again at the USPA Nationals 2007 in Ottawa for the final showdown of the 2007 season. The winner would compete for the USA at the World Meet 2008 in France.

Airspeed and Fastrax both scored once again 20 points and higher in each of the ten rounds, the Golden Knights had one 19-pointer. Unfortunately for Fastrax, Airspeed was at peak performance level at the right time and won by nine points (253 - 244) despite the impressive Fastrax scores.

The Arizona team then prepared for the World Meet 2008 and won the gold medals by one single point over the French national team. Airspeed never again completed a 10-round outdoor meet with only 20-pointers and higher since the USPA Nationals 2007, neither in 2008 nor in 2009.

Only France did exactly that ever since Airspeed's 20-point streak ended in March 2008 in DeLand. No other team at the World Cup 2009 came even close to do the same.

The competition draw in Prostejov even included three 3-block sequences, Round 3 with the fast Block 9 (10-14-9), Round 7 with a slower sequence (15-13-18) and Round 8 with another slower sequence (21-2-20).

The three US top challengers, Arizona Airspeed, Spaceland Force XP and Perris Fury, will push each other at the upcoming USPA Nationals 2009, as Hayabusa Defence was putting pressure on France at the World Cup. It will partially depend on the competition draw whether Airspeed will begin a new series of 20-pointers or whether Fury and Force will join the 4-way elite club.