STEPPING STONES TO SPECIALISM
by Jim Emerton
In 77 I started racing on what I perceived as the initial stages or bottom rung of the racing career ladder. Then the prestige and role model race was to aspire to 500 miles on the day, and in those days it took some doing with feeding systems as they were at that time. Old characters in the local clubs were celebrated heroes, men of power and distinction. My inexperienced, naive philosophy was to do my best, focus and progress with all my birds going over the Channel as a basic test principle. After a long struggle, and in a learning curve my birds mastered greater and greater distances and degrees of hardship, and how wonderful my first clocking on the day at Nantes NFC was with Damien at 466 miles, and then to repeat it many times with yearlings and older birds. I looked at the future and raised the bar of distance - a stepping stone - to Saintes at 569 miles on the day.
At this time Pau at 735 miles seemed like an impossible dream, yet ambition took me with a leap of blind faith across another stone on the arduous journey to specialism. Then in July 1995 I did something that was a little crazy and wondrous, verifying 3 from 6 birds at 879 miles from Barcelona International. Thus followed a heady cocktail of awe, exhaustion and marvel at the stamina and will of the birds to home to my little old loft. Now as I write with poignant reflection, I see all my races and experiences in the sport as stepping stones in a rich and rewarding life, where dreams became REALITY.
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Elimar - December 2014
