Some of the Best of the Greater Distance

NFC Single Bird Club of 2015

By

John Clements

The 'High Quality Point' in most sports is presumed to be the most difficult.  The 'High Point' is the one that expects to find the real quality. In road cycling it is the 'Tour de France', in UK soccer it is the premiership title, In Cricket it is five day Test matches, in Golf it is the 'Majors'.

When it comes to 'High Points' pigeons have a problem. Distance, wind and location are all variables so our sport has difficulty finding its own high point so we have to make rules to find who or what are the best.One of these rules (not agreed by all) is to oblige competing fanciers to nominate a single pigeon to represent them before the race in question is actually flown.  The 'Greater Distance NFC Single Bird nomination is the best and most difficult and as such of the highest quality.  The races involved are, like the title of the club suggests, races of greater distance so not only is it difficult to name a single pigeon, it is unbelievably difficult to even clock your named pigeon. As the club itself quite rightly suggests in its slogan 'This is the Ultimate Test' implying of course, it is the ultimate test of quality.

In the end where we are left with is a relatively few select pigeons that are highly regarded by their owners competing in races where it is difficult to compete successfully.  In truth and in fact all the pigeons that get prizes in a competition of this kind are quality pigeons by virtue of just being there. They are all pigeons that are likely to be foundation pigeons for future families of any loft. Pigeons that often found strains and go down in real history.  This is the standard we are looking at this is the standard that has already done all the weeding necessary  These are the UK's finest, yet largely unknown, long distance fruit waiting to be picked off the best quality tree in the orchard.  Those wise enough to understand exactly what they are looking at and also appreciate the standard are not mean minded individuals. They have higher ideals. . . Most of the actual pigeons will not be for sale their youngsters also will not be for sale their youngsters are more likely to be exchanged with other like minded fanciers who like themselves are looking for the kind of quality that cannot be bought.  This then is a secret exchange market only open to the indoctrinated few or those who still have have something of a high standard in their minds

and don't need to be told where to find it.  This is a small select market place.

Few fanciers get into more than one single bird result and those that do are very lucky or more probably very special trainers and selectors of good pigeons.  John Halstead of Kington Magna in Dorset managed five Greater Distance results in 2015. He had three GDSB results in 2014  so he is proving to be consistent over the years. In  2015 he was  He was 3rd BICC Pau - 8th BICC Barcelona - 5th NFC Tarbes,  2nd BICC Perpignan and 9th NFC YB Guernsey.

John Halstead

The Greater Distance Club is usually not for the big loft sending many pigeons. It is more often found to be small but quality lofts that have intimate knowledge of their pigeons. Dorin Melinte of Stanmore in Middlesex fits exactly into this category not only did he have the only nominated bird clocked in the BBC Palamos race he also was 2nd from Barcelona and 8th from Perpignan with the same pigeon. His '636' was the pigeon that was clocked from both Barcelona and Perpignan; the only nominated pigeon to do so. . Very few manage this feat. Such a pigeon as '636' are the Creme de la creme in pigeon terms and 'Dorin' is the Creme de la crème in terms of a fancier being able to condition and select an individual pigeon for hugely important races. I hope he continues to do so in coming years.

Dorin Melinte

Another fancier and another pigeon well worthy of mention are the '854' of the L and K Buddle partnership of Dover.  '854' won the single bird nomination from Pau with the BICC in mid June and then went on to be 3rd at the end of July from Perpignan so this aristocrat had to be prepared twice in the same year for two long distance races, the first from the Atlantic side of France and the second, hundreds of miles East from the Mediterranean side of France. This is not an easy thing to do. It requires a special high quality pigeon to achieve 'top form' twice in six weeks flying from a different direction over a different course; one up the Atlantic side of France and the other up the Rhone Valley.

L and K Buddle

My third best pigeon is a bird from a loft new to the GDSB club. Few lofts from the North of England compete in this club but those that do generally own special birds. Fletcher and Gobin of Runcorn in Cheshire flying over 700 miles from Tarbes is one such loft. . The pigeon they clocked has at the same time also won the prestigious 'Certificate of Merit' award for scoring three times from 700 miles in the first 200 of the NFC's longest race (only three 700 mile pigeons have achieved this distinction in the history of the NFC) Those of us who are fascinated by long distance marathon racing all remember 'Lol's Pride' the first to do so.  I will not mention its owner but a mention of the pigeon is good enough for the likes of us. That pigeon was the first section 'L' pigeon to win an NFC certificate of merit. 'Lols Pride won it in 1989.

Denis Gobin holding the Caravan Cock

'The Caravan cock'  is the name of this NFC 2015 'Certificate of Merit'  pigeon of Fletcher and Gobin  as so often happens in the formative years of many very good long distance pigeons, this bird was  missing as a young bird and was reported by a non fancier on a caravan site (that’s how he got his name).  The 'Caravan cock' eventually made it home under its own steam but the hard lesson learned obviously paid benefits for the 'Caravan Cocks' super determination in later life.  Such pigeons are conditioned to try and try again to get home regardless of the conditions, regardless of distance and can when fit perform better as the distance increases.   'The Caravan Cock' is now the best 700 mile pigeon in the UK  no wonder it was the 'Fletcher and Gobin' single bird nomination pigeon and no surprise  it won the 'Brian Denny Shield' for the first nominated pigeon flying over 700 miles. If Eton and Harrow or Oxford and Cambridge had pigeon lofts this is the sort of club they would partake in these Greater Distance races. Greater distance races are the type of races that generally inspire academic minded fanciers.