posted Apr 15th, 2005 - Brazil prepares to join the international league community. The Brazilian interest in forming a league for 4-way competition has been there for many years. However, previous plans did not materialize. This time, the current efforts to launch the league seem to have great chances of success. Marconi Medeiros, a member of the Só Pressão Brasil Telecom 4-way team which competes in the AAA Class, contacted the NSL headquarters in June 2004 providing the initial ideas.

Brazil has always had many talented Formation Skydiving teams and competitors, even though very few Brazilian teams joined the international competition at world meets and world cups. In fact, teams from Brazil competed only four times at world meets between 1987 and now.

The World Championship of Formation Skydiving was hosted by Brazil in 1987 and took place right next to the world's mightiest waterfalls in Iguazu. The Brazilian national team finished in 19th position with a 6.0 meet average on home turf. Brazil was also represented two years later at the world meet in Spain and placed 21st with a 7.1 average.

The next appearance of a Brazilian team at a world meet was in 1997 in Turkey. Brazil finished again in 21st place, this time with an 11.1 average. Another team traveled once again to Spain in 2001 and finished in 17th position with a 10.3 average.

All these numbers do not sound very competitive. However, coaches who have worked with Brazilian teams and competitors know better about the great talent and untapped potential. One of these coaches is Airspeed veteran Craig Girard who regularly travels to Brazil to work with teams, competitors and recreational skydivers.

Girard currently prepares for his next trip to Brazil, and once again he will work with teams and competitors. This time, the director of the Brazilian Skydiving League in the works, Fábio Diniz, will be working together with Girard. The Airspeed Odyssey member will miss this weekend's Southwest Skydiving League competition in Eloy. However, he will be able to provide Diniz with great and additional information.

Airspeed Odyssey is prepared to compete tomorrow without Craig Girard. Odyssey's team captain informed the NSL News that Airspeed's multiple world champion in 4-way and 8-way, John Eagle, will fill in at tomorrow's meet in Eloy.

Both Airspeed line-ups, Odyssey and Velocity, will attend the competition on their home turf.

Girard had more exciting news for the NSL audience. Airspeed Odyssey copied the FSL Shamrock Showdown 2005 during their last training and was slightly ahead of DeLand Fire's scores after seven rounds. Girard promised to provide the NSL News with the video footage very soon.

The new Brazilian league will also run one of a few test meets this weekend and will use the synchronized NSL competition draw.

If everything runs smoothly in Brazil this year, there will be nothing in the way for the launch of the new league in 2006. The plans of the "BRNSL" are well thought and laid out by the two founders of CTR, a Formation Skydiving Club, Fábio Diniz and André Ferraz.

Diniz and Ferraz provided more information of the CTR history, which lead into the plans of forming the Brazilian Skydiving League: "CTR was founded in 1998, and since then we have been using our experiences every year to improve and professionalize our operation in Brazil, always focusing on the athletes and the development of the sport. For the past three years, we have had two projects that are very important to our sport, and they are: 1.) Registration of the 4-WAY CTR CUP as the South American Relative Work Championship by the FAI. For this objective we have been negotiating with the Brazilian FAI delegate for the past two years, Mr. Paulo Zanella, and we believe we will obtain the registration soon.

2.) The creation of the Brazilian arm of the NSL, called BRNSL. This was Mr. Marconi’s original idea, which was then shared with us. Mr. Marconi is a great friend of ours and fellow competitor, and we agreed to join forces, so that BRNSL could come to reality."

Diniz and Ferraz have become the main administrators of the new league, which still needs additional planning. The Brazilian league organizers want to work together as close as possible with the NSL: "We want to take the responsibilities of time and investment that would be necessary to represent the NSL professionally in Brazil. However, we did not want to start such a great project without having all details planned and formally correct."

Diniz and Ferraz plan to include other skydiving centers or clubs besides their CTR, as Ricardo Pettena's skydiving school Azul do Vento. Pettena used to be a member od the U.S. 4-way team DeLand VNE in 1993. "We had contacts with Mr. Ricardo Pettena in the past, who is our friend and fellow companion on sport, so one of the meets of CTR 4 WAY CUP could be held on his drop zone. We believe that the BRNSL cannot be restricted to only one drop zone."

The first BRNSL test meet is coming up this weekend. The competition draw has been sent to the meet organizers in Brazil. Hopefully, things will work out fine in South America, and another continent will join the league network successfully very soon. Craig Girard will be able to provide his own feedback after his returning from Brazil in ten days. This weekend's competition draw will be posted on the NSL homepage at 9 p.m. eastern time.