The AS Croatia Derby 2026 has a champion. On September 13, 520 pigeons departed from Pardubice (Czech Republic) to cover 550 kilometers to the central loft in Đakovo, and when the race finished, the first three finishers had arrived within less than a second of each other. A final that has already become a benchmark in European one-loft racing.
A finish of 0.96 seconds
The pigeon CRO.26-33218 , bred by Mario Laketa of Koprivnički Bregi (Croatia), crossed the finish line on September 13th at 15:20:17.860 after more than seven and a half hours of flight. Its official speed was 1,208.0009 meters per minute , equivalent to approximately 72.5 km/h in a straight line over 550 km. Laketa took home the gold cup, the gold medal, and €10,000 as the first-place finisher.
What makes this final exceptional is the distance between the top three finishers. The second-place finisher, Team Ekkel (Netherlands, pigeon NL.26-8421867), arrived just 0.830 seconds after the winner. The third-place finisher, Riciozo Racing Pigeons from North Macedonia (MK.26-260610), finished 0.960 seconds behind the first. Over 550 kilometers and more than seven and a half hours of flight, less than a second separated three pigeons from three different countries.
Team Opacak finished fourth and Tim FAID fifth. The entire top ten was separated by just 25 seconds.
Flight conditions
The race began on September 13th at 7:45 AM with a temperature of 13°C and a headwind. After approximately 150 km, the wind shifted to a crosswind, and conditions continued to change throughout the entire route, with temperatures reaching 25°C at midday. It was a demanding race that combined the pressure of the distance with weather variations that punished a lack of adaptability.
Of the 520 registered participants, 349 pigeons had been recorded by the morning after the flight (September 14 at 8:30 a.m.), representing a return rate of 67% . A reasonable number for a 550 km final under those conditions.
The winning pigeon: Victoria Laketa
Mario Laketa's pigeon, known as Victoria Laketa , didn't arrive at the grand final rested. Just a week earlier, she had completed the 450km semi-final, meaning she flew two high-level competitions in seven days. This ability to recover over long distances is precisely what breeders look for in pigeons destined for demanding races.
The Croatian origin of the winner also has an additional dimension: the AS Croatia Derby bears the country's name as a brand, and the victory of a local breeder in the grand final is no small feat.
A season with four different winners
The 2026 AS Croatia Derby featured four preliminary races before the grand final, with results distributed among breeders from Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, and North Macedonia (Riciozo Racing Pigeons won Stage 6). This diversity of winners speaks to a truly competitive event: no single team dominated the season, leaving the grand final wide open.
The AS Croatia Derby format is typical of European one-loft races: all pigeons are bred and trained in the same central loft in Đakovo, under identical conditions. This eliminates the training variable, leaving genetics, physical condition, and the randomness of flight as the only differentiating factors.
Riciozo Racing Pigeons, the revelation of the season
If there's one name to remember from this edition, it's Riciozo Racing Pigeons from North Macedonia. The team won Stage 6 during the regular season and finished third in the grand final with MK.26-260610, just 0.960 seconds behind the winner. Two top-level performances in the same season, including a podium finish in the final, confirm that this is a pigeon loft worth keeping an eye on.
The context in European one loft racing
The AS Croatia Derby has established itself as a leading one-loft racing event in Central and Eastern Europe. With 520 entries in 2026 and participants from at least three countries in the top five—Croatia, the Netherlands, and North Macedonia—the race attracts diverse genetic stock and delivers results with sporting credibility.
For breeders who participated in this edition or plan to register for the next, recording the pedigrees and results of their pigeons allows them to build a history that supports future entries and sales. FirePedigree allows them to manage this tracking from the first training flight to the result of the grand final.