Olympic gold for von Allmen – and the role of Zünd cutting technology

The 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics are now history. What remains are the outstanding performances of the Swiss team, who returned home with an impressive 23 medals. These success stories are not only the result of exceptional athletes, but also of innovative Swiss companies that contributed to them.
One such company is WAMS AG, based in Buchs (St. Gallen), which produced all the racing suits for the Alpine skiing, bobsleigh, skeleton, luge, ski cross, alpine snowboarding and snowboard cross events. In these events, aerodynamics and suit design are critical to performance and can determine the hundredth of a second that separates victory from defeat. To cut the components for the roughly 2,000 race suits produced this winter for the Olympic Games and the World Cup, WAMS has relied on digital cutting technology from Zünd Systemtechnik for years. 

The race suits worn by athletes such as Odermatt, von Allmen, Meillard, and Vogt were custom-made as unique pieces in Buchs. Each suit is produced entirely on-site — from cutting on a Zünd G3 cutter to printing, stitching, and final quality inspection. For the Olympic Games alone, the 18-person team produced around 370 suits, often under extreme time pressure with new requirements arriving daily as start lists were finalised. 

The decisive edge in efficiency and quality comes from the digitised production workflow. A state-of-the-art 3D body scanner at the Swiss-Ski Technology Centre in Altstätten provides precise body data for the athletes. These measurements form the basis for customised patterns, which WAMS executes with millimetre accuracy using a Zünd G3 cutter with an integrated material-handling solution. 

This digital process enables fully finished, FIS-compliant race suits to be produced within a matter of hours, including those that meet strict air-permeability regulations. Each of the suit’s five individual panels is measured and inspected after printing to ensure it meets the high performance demands of competition.

And when it comes to speed disciplines, where hundredths of a second — less than the blink of an eye — determine the outcome, absolute perfection matters. This is precisely where Zünd’s digital cutting technology delivers its value: precision, repeatability and reliability.

When Swiss ski athletes celebrate success, the teams at WAMS and Zünd share in the pride. The race suit is only one piece of the larger performance puzzle, but an essential one on the journey to Olympic excellence.