Von Frankfurt aus ging es mit der Lufthansa nach Buenos Aires. Im Flieger trafen wir auf Reto Schumacher aus der Schweiz und seinen Helfer Wolfgang Matt aus Liechtenstein.

In a turbulent competition (in all respects) in Schiefbahn I finished 3^rd after Lassi Nurila and Robert Forster. But overall I could win the German Championship for the 6^th time in a row.

Thanks to the MC-Schiefbahn for a well-organized competition!
Thanks to my team and our partners for the great support during this season!

On the 5th and 6th of August, the first leg of the German F3A Championship 2017 was held in Weilheim, Bavaria. It was also the 2nd event run together by the DAeC and DMFV, the 2 big aeromodelling associations in Germany. The 1st was in 2016.
According to some rumors, F3A is almost dead, but the event in Weilheim demonstrated the opposite. A huge number of participants, and many young and talented pilots, flew in 3 different classes for trophies and points.
But for me, there is a clear trend over the past 1-2 years of increasing interest in F3A again.
On Saturday we managed to fly 2 complete rounds of every class (FAI, sport, hobby). Unfortunately the weather turned bad on sunday, and allowed only 1 more P-13 schedule. The last round of sport class and the FAI final round was canceled due to heavy rain.

All in all it was a really good event, traditionally great Bavarian organization without any troubles.
I finished 1st in the competition, closely followed by Christian Niklaß and Robert Forster who finished 2nd and 3rd. In the other classes Max Chrubasik and Walter Lang won.
This was also the last competition for Russell Edwards, our friend from Australia. After 3 months of European F3A, he returned down-under.

Following the invitation from Roberto Rabina Simon, we departed on the 20th of July from Frankfurt-Hahn to Santiago de Compostela to attend the 10th Spanish F3A World Cup in Cerceda.
Cerceda is 30km inland from La Coruna “up the mountains” and is famous for its small but nice WorldCup competition.
Besides my coach Heiko and Albert Wamsler as a judge, my parents spontaneously accompanied us as well.
Our initial concerns with Ryanair were unfounded. Their service, and especially the handling of my large model box, was phenomenal. Fast, trouble-free, careful and cheap. Compliments to Ryanair!
After our arrival Thursday night, we went to the Cerceda field Friday morning for the first time. There were already a few other pilots practicing.
After organising my batteries (they were sent before the event directly from Hacker Motor to Spain), we also started our practice flights and preparation for the competition on Saturday.
It was planned that the competition would start very early Saturday morning. Sadly we had a delay of 3 hours due to low cloud and fog. But despite this, we were able to finish all 4 rounds of P17. After the first round, I was close behind Sebastiano Silvestri, but won the remaining 3 rounds.
A very interesting point was that they changed the flying box after 2 rounds by 180° due to the sun.
On Sunday morning we had the same problem as Saturday: low cloud and fog. But it also rained this time, and finally lead to a premature ending of the competition after 4 rounds of P17, with no final.
The result was that I won the competition against the tough opposition of Sebastiano Silvestri from San Marino and Christian Paradela from Spain.
On Monday we flew back home, after a brief visit to the old city and a part of the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela.

We had a fantastic 4 days in Spain, and enjoyed spending time with many friendly people.
I especially liked seeing again my old friend Andres Leoni and his wife!
Many thanks Roberto for the invitation; it was our pleasure!
Special thanks also to Hacker Motor GmbH for the battery support!

Another great competition with some of Europe’s top pilots took place on the 1st and 2nd of July in Bendern, Liechtenstein. The evening before the competition started, we had fantastic party at Liechtenstein F3A-Pilot and friend Nick Schädler´s home. He organized a barbecue on his balcony with a great view of the mountains.

At the F3A Worldcup, 52 pilots from 16 nations took part and made it into a real mini European Championship. Sadly the weather was bad on Sunday morning and caused a delay of 3 hours. As a result, the final could only include the top 5 pilots, instead of the top 25 as was originally planned.

After the 2 preliminary flights I was 5th and narrowly made it into the finals.

For the finals, I had a very good flight and moved forward to the 4th place overall.

At the price giving ceremony I won one of the most valuable prices: A Swarovski Panther limited to 888 pieces worldwide.
It was well organized event, as is usual in Liechtenstein, and we are already looking forward to next year!

Team RT