Oct 30, 2008, 1:20 PM
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R4 - Nationals 4 Way Team
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I hope this is not true.
I have heard the Nationals 4 Way Intermediate team, R4, from California, winners of the 2008 Gold medel in 4 way Intermediate are all established 4 way Advance/Open fliers. I heard the team was put together a little before Nationals and competed in Intermediate so they could win an easy medal.
R4 Members: Jon Martens Rob Radez Deanna Frank Julius Frank
Does anyone know if this is true, again, I hope it's not.
PhreeZone (D License)
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Oct 30, 2008, 1:51 PM
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Re: [TryHonest] R4 - Nationals 4 Way Team
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Jon Martins flew on Advanced team Onyx that had a 11.70 average in 2006, everyone else was on Byron Deficit Disorder in Intermediate that flew a 10.4 average in 2006. I don't see any of them on the teams that were at 2007 Nationals.
Oct 30, 2008, 1:54 PM
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Re: [TryHonest] R4 - Nationals 4 Way Team
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We competed with them, they were very consistent and pretty nice. Had we played our normal game, we'd have scored similarly (6 more points from busts and more for calmness goes a long way when only 9 points down).
AFAIK Rules - As long as they didn't have 2 or more previous gold medals in intermediate 4-way or higher, they can certainly choose any class to compete in. Their motivation (medal, fun, etc) is really besides the point.
Our team struggled quite a bit on what is considered sandbagging or not, we were split in our vote to go advanced vs intermediate (3-2 for int). It's not that easy to make the call when you have 5 members all with different expectations. We did very well in intermediate, and we'd have been respectable in advanced (likely middle of the pack based on comparably scoring teams based on NSL scoring). Either way, I'd have had fun and been happy - I voted Advanced, but stuck with the team consensus and we had a lot of fun in Intermediate.
But if you look at the last couple of years, gold was a 12.8, and a 13.5 (with the 13.5 a faster draw than this year or last). R4 scored a 13.1 with a nearly bust free (one vid bust only) meet and had a couple teams within a point average.
So, I don't think they were out of line at all and they provided good competition.
I'd say if a team came in and scored a 15 and the next best team was a cluster in the 12's and 11's or so, then you might complain, I guess.
The only way to get out of this is to have a qual round that puts people into their respective classes. That's pretty complicated.
Intermediate at Nationals - If you think of it as a boogie for Type A people, it's easier to handle.
Don't lose any sleep over it, these are nice people.
Oct 30, 2008, 3:30 PM
Post #5 of 18
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Re: [TryHonest] R4 - Nationals 4 Way Team
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In reply to:
I hope this is not true.
I have heard the Nationals 4 Way Intermediate team, R4, from California, winners of the 2008 Gold medel in 4 way Intermediate are all established 4 way Advance/Open fliers. I heard the team was put together a little before Nationals and competed in Intermediate so they could win an easy medal.
R4 Members: Jon Martens Rob Radez Deanna Frank Julius Frank
Does anyone know if this is true, again, I hope it's not.
I'm going to try and keep a level head because the R4 folks are friends and coaches of mine. Honestly I don't know why I'm bothering to feed an obvious troll, however here I go.
As has been said, Jon is the only member who has competed in Advanced. The rest have their previous competition experience in Intermediate.
No, they were not formed just before Nationals. My team has been training with them at iFly for months before Nationals, and I believe Rob said they formed not too long after last year's Nationals. They've been training their butts off, in addition to providing free coaching to local belly fliers. They certainly worked hard to earn their gold, and didn't just toss the team together to get a easy medal.
Rob told me that they were considering competing in advanced, but due to their performance with the AA blocks, they didn't think it appropriate to try and learn the slot switchers of the AAA blocks.
I'm not going to try to guess why someone would make anonymous accusations like this. I can only hope it's an honest mistake.
Again, more support for the great internet sociologist: John Gabriel I really hate the internet some times.
Oct 30, 2008, 11:25 PM
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Re: [TryHonest] R4 - Nationals 4 Way Team
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dammit why is the camera guy always left off the team list.
not to be picky but R4 had 2 busts and incomplete separation in round 1 and a omission video on exit of round 4 (they struggled with the exit and a grip was behind a torso or something the video was there the grip wasn't)
Wish people like this would sack up and take off the mask. Yeah everybody can be tough on the internet.
Now if you will excuse me I want to go rub my balls with my gold medal j/p
(This post was edited by jtiflyer on Oct 30, 2008, 11:30 PM)
Oct 31, 2008, 6:51 AM
Post #9 of 18
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Re: [TryHonest] R4 - Nationals 4 Way Team
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In reply to:
I hope this is not true.
I have heard the Nationals 4 Way Intermediate team, R4, from California, winners of the 2008 Gold medel in 4 way Intermediate are all established 4 way Advance/Open fliers. I heard the team was put together a little before Nationals and competed in Intermediate so they could win an easy medal.
R4 Members: Jon Martens Rob Radez Deanna Frank Julius Frank
Does anyone know if this is true, again, I hope it's not.
Oct 31, 2008, 1:48 PM
Post #11 of 18
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Re: [jtiflyer] R4 - Nationals 4 Way Team
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In reply to:
dammit why is the camera guy always left off the team list.
not to be picky but R4 had 2 busts and incomplete separation in round 1 and a omission video on exit of round 4 (they struggled with the exit and a grip was behind a torso or something the video was there the grip wasn't)
Wish people like this would sack up and take off the mask. Yeah everybody can be tough on the internet.
Now if you will excuse me I want to go rub my balls with my gold medal j/p
Sorry Jason! You rock too! (In my defense, I didn't come up the list in the OP). Seeya soon
Nov 2, 2008, 6:42 PM
Post #14 of 18
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Re: [harryskydives] R4 - Nationals 4 Way Team
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Wow ...
... let us look at the history ....
The facts are: 1) In 2001 they averaged 12.5 and took 4th place in Intermediate (the winning average that year was 14.0) 2) In 2002 they averaged 14.1 in intermediate and took gold. 3) They we officially ELIGIBLE to compete in intermediate that year 4) they all moved on to advanced class in 2003 and did very well (in different lineups). In fact, Bu and Jim demonstrated what they are made of by winning the gold medal with Spaceland Inferno.
(This post was edited by AMax on Nov 2, 2008, 8:07 PM)
Nov 3, 2008, 9:21 AM
Post #17 of 18
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Re: [harryskydives] R4 - Nationals 4 Way Team
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OMG - Harry played the baby-killer card!!! Dating yourself a bit by the Juggs reference!!!
FWIW - As a long time 4-way junkie and now judge, one of whom judged R4 during the SCSL meets, they were (a) legally in Intermediate and (b) in the division where they belonged. Nuff said. I really dislike seeing Jon's name even mentioned in this light. He is a class act all the way and I would venture to guess that a fair amount of consideration was given to the appropriate class in which to compete.
Congrats to R4 for a solid, clean performance at Nationals. Steve GT
(This post was edited by jmpwme on Nov 3, 2008, 9:50 AM)
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