Twenty pilots on Via Nassa

Lugano Elegance has always been a weekend about cars and the people who care for them. In 2026, for the first time, some of those people were eight years old.

The Junior Grand Prix, run in partnership with the International School of Ticino, brought twenty children between the ages of eight and twelve to the cobbles of Via Nassa on pedal go-karts. They raced the length of the street toward the LAC, on the same stones that hours earlier had carried pre-war coachwork, and the whole of Piazza Battaglini was closed off and given over to them and their families for the day.

It was a full day, not a gesture. There was face painting. A local pizzeria set up and made lunch for the pilots. And when the racing finished, the medal ceremony was held on the main stage, the same one the concours itself uses, with a performance from a Lugano dance school before the medals were given out. Läderach was waiting at the end with a goodie bag of chocolate for every child who raced.

The reasoning is the same one behind the Junior Judges programme and the apprentices from Biasca. A concours depends on people who know how to look at a car, and that knowledge has to be handed to someone. It starts earlier than most people assume.

The children who raced on Via Nassa in 2026 will not remember the horsepower figures. They will remember that the street was closed for them.