The second âśunofficialâť Swiss Truggy Championship was held on June 12/13. Itâ™s an unofficial championship because there was no truggy category sanctioned by the national RC association yet. But that didnâ™t stop 26 truggy drivers from all over Switzerland from attending the race! Last year â“ when it was held for the first time (and where I won) â“ there were even more drivers (also from Germany and Austria) but this year some other races scheduled at the same time meant there were a lot fewer truggy racers attending.
To fill up the field at the same time there was a Buggy Grand Prix with 44 drivers ⓠmany driving both categories ⓠand even the first ever electric-only 1/8th race had 5 drivers. The MORC Oberbüren had prepared a very fine new track with lots of elevation changes, jumps and obstacles⦠and even a concrete banked corner at the end of the long straight!
Early Saturday morning it rained for about two hours, but then luckily the weather improved a lot and the track dried up. We ran the entire Saturday with 4 qualifying heats for each category. It was a bit stressful to drive and then marshall two categories, and I also had to pit for two of my clubmates, but it was a lot of fun and time passed quickly. I couldnâ™t make any setup changes to my cars all day (apart from trying different tyres), but they both ran very well so it was no problem. At the end the truggy was even a bit faster than the buggy, but overall times of the heats were about the same. I managed to win both categories by TQâ ing each one twice, but in the end only by 1 second each over the 2nd place drivers Ronny (Truggy) and Sven (Buggy). It was very close and we were looking forward to the finals on Sunday.
On Sunday morning it rained again, but sadly this time it didnâ™t stop until lunchtime. The race had to be canceled since the track was now under water on most parts. It was a shame but at least we had had a very dry and warm Saturday (although Saturday night wasnâ™t dry at allâ¦).
The race was counted as per our qualifying results and I was happy to defend my Truggy title and also win the Buggy GP in the first two-category nitro race I ever drove. I would have preferred to win through proper finals, though. Patrick Hess placed both his Buggy and Truggy in 4th place in his first Truggy race ever. Gilbert Schnidrig won the electric category with his converted XB8 EC.
Final results
(click to enlarge)
Truggy
1. Robin Frischkopf XRAY XT8
2. Ronny LĂĽber
3. Daniel Amsler 4. Patrick Hess XRAY XT8
5. Manuel Rapp
