Swiss F3A Championship

On August 24 and 25, the second round of the F3A pilots’ competition took place in Riggisberg. Following their success at the World Championships in Italy, everyone was eager to see if the national team pilots—Matti, Rubin, and Schumacher—were still in top form. They were still in top form—they left no room for doubt, flying far ahead of the rest. Under ideal weather conditions, competition director Regina Schmitter welcomed 14 pilots on Saturday morning. The judges were Daniela Schmitter, Peter Scheidegger, Claude Suter, Walter Martig, and, from a neighboring country, Gianluigi Giannoni of Italy. The turnout of spectators was modest, and the reason was quickly apparent: the Swiss Federal Wrestling Festival was also taking place!

Digitalization hasn’t stopped here either—scorers are no longer needed, and the scoring system has become modern; we almost had too many staff members on the field.

Saturday’s four rounds were completed quickly. On Sunday, two more pilots joined the competition, flying the B program. In the highly challenging final flights of the top six pilots, the NA pilots left no chance for those behind them. Sandro Matti remained in the lead, followed by “Verbrenner” Marc Rubin ahead of Reto Schumacher. They were followed by Philipp Schürmann. He arrived on crutches and had to fly while seated, which was certainly no advantage. Fifth place went to Adrian Amrein, and in sixth place was Schürmann’s father, the indomitable Alois.

In the B program, the two gave each other no quarter; in the end, the young Jonas Ronner edged out Lucerne’s Jürg Kuoni by the narrowest of margins.

*Ueli von Niederhäusern*