Keith Mott

The French Young Bird Derby (One Loft Race)

John and Lou McGee started a new event at their now well established ‘Barcelona Challenge Lofts’ in Hernicourt in France, in the form of the new ‘French Young Bird Derby’ one loft race. The first event was in the 2011 season and turn out to be an outstanding success, with the youngsters competing for many thousands of pounds, which was paid to the first 20 birds clock in the final race, including: 1st £20,000: 2nd £5,000: 3rd 3,000: 4th 2,000: 5th £1,000: 6th £500. The babies got four build up or ‘hot spot’ races from Montesson (104 miles), Ablis (212 miles), Blois (195 miles), Canappeville (103 miles) and then in July were sent to the final and big money race from Poitiers (280 miles). The returns were good from Poitiers, with the leading birds taking about seven hours to cover the journey to the loft at Hernicourt.

The winning pigeon ‘11224’ was entered by the very successful Fontwell partnership of Ian Crammond and Nigel Langstaff, who have enjoyed a wonderful season in 2011. Their loft on the south coast is full of quality and have had several premier wins in National and Classic races to back it up. Winners of 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th open NFC in the 2011 season, 1st open BICC, 1st open L&SECC (three times) in recent seasons and several section A winners in the NFC, including three times 1st section in 2011.

Ian Crammond has been in the sport 60 years and has won it all in that time including three times 1st open L&SECC, 1st open BICC and 1st section in the NFC several times. He tells me the partners have several families going well at the present time including the Mark & Dick Evans / Gaby Vandenabeele, Peter Van Osch and Emil Dennys. He has had his present loft set up at Fontwell about 20 years and has taken Nigel on as a full pigeon partner in recent seasons. Ian can’t praise Nigel enough, saying he is first class pigeon man and is mostly responsible for their outstanding racing success in the past few seasons.  Ian likes the continental families of pigeons, with going over to Belgium and Holland obtaining top class birds being a big part of his hobby, which he joys as he has made some good friends of fanciers from over the English Channel. When he goes out to obtain new stock he always goes to lofts that are winning consistently with very big birdage in the National and Combine races. Ian says years ago he enjoyed long distance racing and did not mind waiting several days to clock a bird from Spain, but these days he only likes one day racing, up to about 550 miles.

The partners race 120 cocks on the widowhood system and these racers are split in to two teams, one for sprint to middle distance and the other for long distance. The racers are not broke down, being fed on a good widowhood mixture and the two teams are trained separate and flown out around the loft separate. Nigel likes racing out to places like Bordeaux and Saintes, but his ambition is to win 550 miles National race. The partner’s long distance loft is the focal centre of the magnificent set up and Ian calls it ‘master control’. It is about 50ft long, with a corridor where the birds trap into off landing boards and all the nest boxes are self cleaning, with the fronts being colour coded to each section. The loft has a closed in front with Perspex windows, an office to keep all pigeon records, a roomy full length flight at the rear for the widowhood hens and all clocking is on ETS. Ian says the long distance loft is the product of many year of work altering it to get it right. The sprinting widowhood cocks are housed in 50ft loft with a pan tiled roof, open door trapping and is totally closed in. Ian’s pride and joy is his magnificent stock loft and flights, which house over 100 pairs of breeders that have been obtained from the very best continental champions over the years. The partners like to pair the stock birds up early in the year and each family has it own section in the loft.

Ian and Nigel breed about 300 youngsters every season and sell 100 of them, with the rest being retained for racing. They are all put on the ‘dark’ system and raced natural to the perch. The young bird loft is 40ft long, with open door trapping and on race days the birds go down to a small door at low level, so they can be registered on the ETS system. If the weather is good the babies are trained from Southampton, which is a 40 minute fly, five days a week and are raced out the longest NFC and BBC young bird race points. The partners don’t break the youngsters down and feed them the same widowhood mixture as the old birds. Nigel tells me he used to enjoy only old bird racing, but these days seems to enjoy his young bird racing more.

The first ten in the first ‘French Young Bird Derby’ race result from Poitiers were: 1st Crammond & Langstaff: 2nd Burns & Sallis: 3rd Crammond & Langstaff: 4th Mike Cooney: 5th Gauld & Morrison: 6th T. & D. Davies: 7th Mike Cooney: 9th Knowles & Reed: 10th Harbour Rockets / Ken Lewis.

I recently had a trip out to France and visited Hernicourt, and must say it was nice to see John and Lou McGee looking so well and enjoying life in rural France. The ‘Barcelona Challenge Loft’ has some very good sponsorship and the ETS timing system is sponsored by Bricon. Patrick De Muylder the technical adviser for Beyers pigeon feeds was at the McGee’s home when I visited there and we had a good chat about his company, which has celebrated its 100th birthday recently. Beyers sponsor the Barcelona lofts for all their feeding and I must say the pigeons look brilliant on it!

The two Barcelona Challenge lofts are sited on top of a hill at the rear of the property and over look the rolling hills and wonderful French country side. John McGee tells me there is no real hawk problem out there and in the two years he has been living there he has not lost one pigeon to the predators. A perfect place to race pigeons! The loft location is 630 miles from Barcelona and was set up five years ago by John McGee and John Tyerman with sole intention of competing in International races. John McGee’s wife, Lou, is a major worker in the one loft project and as well as looking after their two children, Sophie Louise and Connor, general work around the loft, she dose all the training in the partner’s Geraldy trailer. The birds are raced on the round about system and have been successful from the Barcelona International in recent seasons. These birds get three races up to Angouleme, 350 miles, in preparation for the Barcelona race and are repaired the day before marking, and given the open hole and straw for their nest bowls. John says cocks and hens are sent to the Barcelona International and the following season, as three year olds they are sent to Barcelona and Perpignan. When I spoke to John on my visit he was very excited at the prospect of sending top pigeon to compete from Barcelona in the 2012 season!

John and Lou McGee were formally of Worthing in Sussex and were out standing fanciers at all distances, when they raced in England. John won 1st open NFC Pau, 1st open L&SECC Alencon, 1st open BICC, over 400 first in club racing and over 100 times 1st Federation. Brilliant pigeon racing! I think it is common knowledge that Lou writes in the pigeon fancy press and is a very hard worker at the lofts in France. John started up in the sport in 1975 and has enjoyed outstanding success every season, racing from all distances. The English McGee loft had won the Federation countless times through the years and John says he enjoys any race, from 60 through to 600 miles. He raced mainly cocks and hens on the roundabout system, with a few cocks on the widowhood, all of which were paired up in mid-February. The sexes were trained separately, but were often sent to the same race, with no real problem with trapping if the cocks and hens arrive home together. John had two smart racing lofts in Worthing and both were closed in for the roundabout system. The old birds loft had a pan tile roof, three sections, and the old birds were trapped in a corridor and through open doors. The young birds loft had sputnik traps and the inmates were raced on the light system. His wonderful team of youngsters were on the light 20 hours every day and followed John around the garden, like a flock of sheep, looking for their peanuts. John’s pigeons were 90% Janssen, with a few Jan Aarden and were bred down from Belgium Gold Wing champion bloodlines. He had the ‘Houdini’ bloodlines and says his best racers including his Pau National winner are from these lines. His 16 pairs of stock birds were housed in a nice big stock loft, with a wire flight. One of John’s stock birds, which I looked at on my visit to his Worthing lofts, was a handsome blue chequer cock, a retired champion racer which had won 20 times 1st on the road and he was half brother to the Pau National winner. His full brother was the sire of the 1998 London & South East Classic Club Alencon winner. A wonderful family of pigeons!

That it for this week! I can be contacted with any pigeon comments on telephone number: 01372 463480.