SAC EURO CONTEST TOUR SWITZERLAND 2026

The second competition will take place in Feistritz an der Gail, Austria, and the third competition will be held in Hirzenhain, Germany.

For the first competition in Frauenfeld, the weather forecasts had been quite dire for days in advance. Our organizer, René Koblet, tirelessly studied and evaluated the weather models and ultimately gave the go-ahead for the competition to proceed.

A total of 29 pilots braved the weather, including teams that had traveled from far away in Germany and Austria.

The competitors and judges used Friday morning as a training opportunity. Even then, the tow team was already hard at work.

After lunch, we kicked off the competition with the familiar Unlimited and Advanced programs. No participants had registered for the Rookie or Regio programs.

The Rookie program is kept very simple to give beginners the opportunity to participate in competitions. Through frequent practice, they quickly advance to the Regio level, and as their experience grows, they later move up to the Advanced or Unlimited categories.

The five judges evaluated the individual maneuvers according to precise criteria for precision, geometry, and symmetry. Using the e-Scribe system, this process went very smoothly without taking their eyes off the model.

Friday was marked by some unpredictable weather. During the few brief interruptions, the models were covered with tarps. And after a few moments of socializing, the competition was able to resume each time in good spirits.

Saturday brought the highlight of the event: the aerial display programs. Accompanied by music and visually enhanced with smoke, the pilots painted their sequences of figures across the blue sky and, upon landing, received thunderous applause from the now-large crowd that had gathered.

The event concluded with the customary group photo featuring all the models and pilots, followed by the announcement of the rankings.

This time, the podium spots went exclusively to the valiant Swiss competitors. In the Advanced category, Adrian Amrein took first place with 4,961.78 points. Sandro Rupp followed in second place, just 1.44 points behind. Oliver Rentsch secured third place. In the Unlimited category, however, all three countries were represented. Daniel Nagel from Austria took first place. Ulrich Treyz from Germany secured second place, followed by Silvio Meier from Switzerland in third. One particularly commendable act of sportsmanship occurred between two competitors. Due to a technical malfunction with his transmitter, Klaus Peter Müller was unable to get his model airborne. Without hesitation, Nils Kägi lent him his own transmitter along with his competition model. We all know how it must feel to fly someone else’s transmitter and model without any practice flights. Despite this setback, Klaus Peter placed fifth in the Advanced category, while Nils finished seventh in the Unlimited category.