OmniSkore! coverage of the 2008 US Nationals.
Omnibits by Tim Wagner

Saturday, 25 October

0700
Hot dawg! CF 8-way is in the air on the last day of competition. Over by the wind tunnel, there is a jump-off in Accuracy, and 10-way FS Speed will be on call shortly...

...a reader asks:

What's up with OmniSkore on CF 8-way speed?? Looks different than all previous postings.

That's because the judges decided to use stopwatches instead of OmniSkore for judging, so our software doesn't generate a web page from it. I don't know why they decided that.

And once again: If you would like a high-resolution original photo of your team, click HERE, and BE SURE TO ENTER YOUR TEAM NUMBER! And as usual, I ask for a modest donation to one of the USPA trust funds...

0900
10-way team photos have been posted, but no judging yet...I have heard scuttlebutt that the teams want to do round 6 out of the DC3, wouldn't that be cool...

...the most cherished award at every USPA Nationals is not a USPA recognized medal, but it is known as the C.G. Godfrog Good Vibes Award. The oldest trophy in formation skydiving, the Godfrog is presented each year at the National Championships to the 10-way speed team that demonstrates the best sportsmanship and "good vibes". The winning team is responsible for choosing its successor at the following Nationals. Airspeed, you do have it, right? You didn't give it to Neal for safekeeping, did you? ;-)

Last year's 10-way event at SDC was memorable because the winning team, Airspeed, took a maximum score of 40.00 on round one and found themselves deep in the whole. But on round five, the Golden Knights posted a 40.00 of their own, opening the door for the biggest comeback in 10-way history for Airspeed. Please, no 40's this year guys!

One of the fun things about 10-way speed is what you do after you complete the formation and hold it for 5 seconds: basically, whatever you want (outside of practicing  for the next round). Perris just whipped the tail of the dragon around and spanked that dragon's nose a couple of times. Pretty funny stuff...okay, round 1 is in the can and the separation between 1st and 3rd place is 1.65 seconds. Much better!

A reader asks:

So what’s the story behind the “You didn't give it to Neal for safekeeping, did you?” comment?

Airspeed is holding a sign that says "Hi Neal" in their team photo, and Neal's not here. That would be Neal Houston.

KFC has written up a wonderful report on the VFS event, and you can find it here. A sample:

Amy Chmelecki of Arizona Arsenal points out “We’re benefiting from FS (formation skydiving). They completely set the standard and they teach us everything they know.” Furthermore, she adds “We have speed on our side because we go 160-170 mph so physics helps. We can go faster because we’re vertical plus compared with FS we have less distance from each other but most importantly, because formation skydiving already wrote all the rules. We do what they do.” Team Jedi, the silver medalist for advanced, takes this to heart and was the only team who competed in both VFS and FS.

Thank you very much KFC, great stuff! Go read the whole thing...

...round 2 of 10-way is done and the Knights have edged in front of Airspeed by about half a second, while Perris 10 is about 9 seconds back...

1130
Eye candy: Jan has posted some more VFS videos on the main page, and here is Mandrin's 40-point round 1. Judges are working on 10-way round 3, and half way through the event, the Knights look determined to prevent Airspeed from sweeping the FS events two years in a row...

...Cheryl Stearns has added yet another gold medal in Accuracy to her incredible list of achievements in Style & Accuracy...they are judging style now...Cheryl won Accuracy with a score of $0.01. That's one penny, one centimeter, in 10 rounds, in what were probably less-than-perfect conditions. What an amazing athlete and competitor...

...10-way FS round 3 hasn't been finalized, but I ran the math and Airspeed has edged into the lead by 0.13 seconds. I think we're going to have a fun finish!

...WHOOWEEE Judy let me judge round 4 of 10-way, and Airspeed and the Knights both had excellent jumps and they both did absolutely hilarious antics after the formation. The Knights played Ride 'em Cowboy and Airspeed built a remarkable10-way star with 5 belly-up and 5 belly-down. Wow. And the scores: After 4 rounds, those two teams are 0.06 seconds apart. Perris 10 took a 40.00 on the round because the video did not show a base and pin, so now they are 0.44 seconds ahead of Jumpzillas for the bronze. Holy cow! And here all along I've been wondering where the C.G. Godfrog Award was, and the whole time it was sitting right outside of manifest ;-)...round 5 has been posted, and Airspeed picked up 1.1 seconds on the Knights, but...since round 6 is out of the DC3, who knows what's going to happen?

1400
I grabbed the camera and made it down the ramp in time to get some DC3 shots:

The original and beautiful DC-3, the glory days of 10-way, when the "tail" was lucky to get out in one piece.
If you park a golf cart loaded with flyers behind a DC-3, it will make somewhat of a mess.

The 8-way CF is finished, and hopefully we'll have a prettier page up later. The judges used stop-watches and I just pasted the spreadsheet into html. As soon as 10-way FS is done I'll be packing up this PC and getting ready for tonight's banquet. I'll try to post a few photos on a final page tomorrow.

This final round of 10-way out of a DC-3...when was the last time 10-way was done from a DC-3? Remember the no-show exits and hurling a chunk out that little door? You could tell who the tail slot was by all the bruises they got in training.

1530
Finally, round 6 is being judged, and the Knights posted a 19.89. Airspeed up next, they post a 17.22 and have for the second year in a row swept the FS events. Those guys are pretty good. For this last round of 10-way, they changed the dive to a good old fashioned star.

Airspeed has awarded the C.G. Godfrog Award to....?




Note: All Omnibits commentary are the expressed opinions of the writer, not USPA or Skydive Arizona.