It’s not just wing loading.

Second planes need to be fairly tough because they take a beating. I think they might get tougher treatment than a trainer, especially if the pilot moves to the second plane too soon. If a pilot goes to a second plane because of a crashed trainer, and doesn’t want to buy another trainer, the second plane will have to suffer through the learning curve.

This happened to my brother. I was with him at the field while he was flying his trainer. I had expressed interest in flying. We decided that I’d fly, playing “pass the transmitter.” At this point my brother had maybe 10 solo flights under his belt and we shouldn’t have done what we did. We were doomed from the start. I got the plane out of shape so bad that he couldn’t recover and it went in like a lawn dart. I was bothered by the crash; he just said, “Well, now we know how NOT to do it.” We stuffed it in a trash bag and stopped at the hobby shop on the way home. He wanted an Avistar, but, it was backordered at Hobbico; so he got a Big Stik 40. That poor plane took a beating but it was tough enough to survive. At first, he had to put the cg way forward and tone down the control throws. As he learned more he was able to move the cg and increase the throws.

I didn’t attempt flying again until I got my own stuff and hooked up with one of the club instructors

Four Star, Big Stik, Ultra Stick, Goldberg Tiger, (and similar planes) have fairly light wing loading and they are pretty tough. They can fly pretty slow and many people say they land a lot like trainers.

Funtana is built super light. I think many people would break the fuselage trying to land it if it was their first plane after a trainer.