July 13-15, Skydive Spaceland–Houston in Rosharon, Texas, hosted its second annual Pre-Nationals Competition, a Nationals-style meet with Nationals-quality judging for competitors to tune up before the USPA National Skydiving Championships. This year, eight 4-way formation skydiving teams, three 8-way FS teams and two mixed formation skydiving teams took the opportunity to get experience with a panel of judges led by frequent Nationals chief judge Jim Rees, using the Omniskore!HD scoring system. Rees, who held an FS judge’s course in the days before the competition, had his newly rated judges jump right into practical experience by judging the event.
New for this year, the DZ awarded cash prizes for the open classes of 4-way and 8-way FS. Dallas 350ish took first and the cash in 4-way open with 103 points in eight rounds (12.9 average), with Get Schwifty taking second and 4 the Love of Dogs in third. Spaceland Lite 8 won the 8-way open event with 51 points in six rounds (8.5 average), and Wherespeed came in second with 38 points (6.3 average). Pickup team Gravit8, many of whom hadn’t flown 8-way before, won intermediate with nine points.
The 4-way intermediate class included Spaceland Toxic, which won handily with 92 points in eight rounds (11.5 average). Three of the remaining four teams were also part of the Toxic family of teams, with Toxic Heveh coming in second with 79 points and tying Toxic (affectionately known as “Toxic OG”) in three rounds. Kinetic, visiting from Georgia, took third with 60 points. Toxic Envy and Highly Toxic rounded out the leaderboard with 41 and 21 points.
In mixed formation skydiving, PCC edged out Iron Monkeys for the win with 27 points in five rounds (5.4 average). Iron Monkeys kept the race tight, winning two rounds and finishing only five points behind.
Great weather graced the meet again this year, enabling teams to complete all rounds easily over the weekend with time to spare. The newly opened Landing Point Cafe provided fantastic meals for competitors, while manifestors, pilots, packers, loaders, judges, video editor Nick Lott and meet directors worked their tails off with early morning starts to make it all happen. Several competitors also enjoyed getting gift certificates from vendors including Advanced Aerospace Designs, Bev Suits, Blue Skies Magazine, Ouragan Suits and United Parachute Technologies.
“From a competitor perspective, things ran as well as—if not better than—many nationals events,” said Dave Grabowski of Spaceland Lite.
“It’s great to see Pre-Nationals growing,” said Spaceland owner Steve Boyd. “I’m really looking forward to next year’s competition, and congrats to the winners!”
Scores, team photos and videos are available at houston.skydivespaceland.com/prenats2018.
In 2019, Spaceland will hold Pre-Nationals July 19-21, and it will again include 4-way and 8-way FS and MFS.
Christy West | D-21464
Fresno, Texas