“ON THE ROAD” WITH KEITH MOTT.
Three Borders Federation (Okehampton Race).
The 2025 racing season has finish and I must say, I can’t believe how quick that time has gone! The time has flown past! It has been a brilliant season, with Saturday team producing some great sport for the Three Borders Federation membership. And of course, as per normal it’s a big ‘thank you’ to our wonderful secretary, Stuart Emans for all his good work. The last race was flown from Okehampton in late August and turned out to be probably one of the easiest races of the season, certainly the easiest young bird race of the season. Because of a very bad weather forecast for the proposed day of this the longest young bird race, the birds were marked on Saturday for a Sunday race. The young birds had a 170 mile fly from Okehampton and Dom McCoy liberated at 07.30hrs in to a South / South West wind situation. The birds had a quick fly home in the tail wind and at the end of the race member reported excellent returns. I don’t know, but I think it might be a new record achieved in the Three Borders Federation! Our secretary, Stuart Emans who races in the Mitcham & Merton club recorded his sixth Federation winner of the 2025 season from this Okehampton and took the first 24 positions on the result sheet. Absolutely brilliant pigeon racing by our Stuart this season! Another first for me, that I can remember, is Stuart’s first two pigeon were his two natural youngsters, ‘Belgium Jess’ and ‘Henry 658’ and both were on the very same velocity, 1759.061, to be joint Federation winners. It is a double congratulation to Stuart, who has won the ‘Individual Points Trophy’ for the second season on the trot. Well done mate and thanks for all your good work!
The first ten in the Okehampton Federation result were: 1) Stuart Emans 1759: 2) Stuart Emans 1759: 3) Stuart Emans 1756: 4) Stuart Emans 1756: 5) Stuart Emans 1756: 6) Stuart Emans 1756: 7) Stuart Emans 1755: 8) Stuart Emans 1750: 9) Stuart Emans 1748: 10) Stuart Emans 1748. This was the las race of the season and at this point the Mitcham & Merton have won the the ‘Federation Points Trophy’ with 76 points and the Ashridge club are R/U on 72 points. Stuart Emans won the ‘Individual Points Trophy’ for the second year on the trot with 103 points, with Terry Goodsell R/U on 92 points. Congratulations to you all! Thanks to ‘Hire and Higher Bouncy Castles Sweets and Treats’ who are now sponsoring the Three Borders Federation.
After the race I had a chat with Stuart and asked him for general summery and this is it. The build up to this race was a little challenging due to the weather forecast for the Saturday changing daily. As the Federation Secretary it was my aim to give our members the best chance of a good race, with the information available at the time and many conversations with our convoyer, Dom McCoy it was decided to postpone the race until the Sunday. The race day arrived and the birds were liberated at 7:30am in a South / South West Wind. My morning routine on race day is to clean the lofts, feed and water all the birds that are not racing and prepare for the arrival of the race birds. The ETS is always checked in good time; the birds weren’t expected home for a few hours so it was off to the café to have breakfast with a club mate Nick Dudley who only having a few young birds and heavy in the moult stopped racing a few weeks earlier. Sitting in the garden waiting for the birds we discussed the season and how competitive it’s been between Terry Goodsell from the Ashridge club and myself. Terry is a house hold name in the Three Borders Federation and had a great race the previous week taking the first ten positions in the Federation from Honiton and picking up ten points and going ten points clear at the top of the points table. I needed to take the first four positions in the Federation to retain the ‘Individual Points Trophy; which was going to be a big ask. On race day it is a running joke between Nick and Jim on how I can’t sit still and pace up and down wearing out the patio with a flur bird in hand. Nick has a beady eye and he can pick out a returning bird from miles away today his skills were not needed as all of a sudden the sky above the loft was full of returning birds. The Flur bird was released and managed to pull 2 birds straight down recording the same velocity 1759.061 and flying 2 hours 52 minutes 5 seconds. The rest of the arriving birds followed and within 2 minutes I had 25 pigeons on the clock. I now had the long wait until leaving for the club and having the clocks read.
At the club we all sat down enjoying a few beers and discussing the day’s race and returns while we all eagerly awaited our club secretary, Dave Lebby to produce the result. The result was distributed by the hard working Ray who himself doesn’t race pigeons. Ray always arrives at the club on a basketing night hours before any one turns up getting all the race crates ready. Thank you Ray on behalf of all the Mitcham members for your dedication and hard work! A great way to end the season, I had won the club for the eleventh time taking the first 15 on the result. All eyes and ears were on our phones waiting for the other club results to come in. The Ashridge result pinged up on the WhatsApp group and to my great surprise I had won the Federation for the sixth time, and gaining enough points to retain the Federation Rose Bowl trophy. My first two pigeons clocked on the same velocity where a blue chequer cock, GB25A57658 now named ‘Henry 658’ after my nephew and the red chequer hen BE25416225, now named ‘Belgium Jess’ after my niece. The sire of ‘Henry 658’ is a Gerald Delaney cock purchased as a young bird in 2023 and he was paired to a gifted pigeon from Kevin Pratt of Mitcham. The nest pair from this pairing have both won the Federation this season. The red chequer hen, ‘Belgium Jess’ was a purchase from Lier Market. That’s the 2025 season over, it’s now time to rest our birds and hopefully get them through a great moult so we can all enjoy a successful breading season next year. Racing season 2026 will soon come around!
As the Three Borders Federation Secretary moving forward it’s my aim to try and grow the Federation. With growing costs in all aspects of life, racing our pigeons is becoming harder and harder especially as membership is dwindling. With this in mind it would be great if we could get together with other Federations and at first start to have some Amalgamation races. Then in the future with the aim to transport the birds together on one transporter so we can achieve racing our birds at a longer distance and this would make racing a lot more cost effective. I know there are hurdles to jump but we need to all look to the future to secure racing for all. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the club secretary’s for their incredible hard work and support in my first year as secretary of the Federation. I would also like to thank all the Federation members for their continued support racing with the Three Borders Federation. And a very big thanks to our conveyer, Dom McCoy for all of his hard work, and putting the welfare of our race birds first.
A Tribute to Allen Palmer of Esher.
I was very saddened to hear of the passing Allen Palmer of the Esher & District RPC on 31st August after a period of ill health. Allen was a lovely man and probably one of the best workers for the sport of pigeon racing I’ve ever had the pressure to meet. It’s always great to see one of the sport’s really outstanding workers do well racing their pigeons! I joined the Esher & District RPC in the mid 1980’s and in all my time the main ‘spearhead’ in the club was the secretary, Allen Palmer. He had been club secretary and President for most of that time and had pretty much guided it through the years into the great organization it is today. In all my time in the club, Allen with a lot of help from his wife Jackie, had organized the Esher club’s annual prize presentation evenings, which have always been a great occasions. Both Allen and Jackie are from pigeon racing families, with both their late fathers, Bill Palmer and Dennis Nightingale, being outstanding fanciers and founder members of the Esher club. Allen had worked in the building trade most of his life and in recent years his firm re-build the new West End Sports & Social Club complex where the Esher pigeon club has been based for many years. He has also done a lot of work in the Boy Scout movement over the years and was a first class cricketer.
Allen Palmer was a natural ‘Channel’ racing man through and through, and had won his fair share over the years with his pigeons, including firsts in the Federation. One of his best seasons racing was in 2008, when he won the Three Borders Federation twice, from Yelverton and West Bay, with his two natural cocks, ‘Billy Blue’ and ‘West Ender’. The 2016 racing season was a particularly good one for the Allen Palmer loft at West End, with him winning several premier positions, including 1st Three Borders Federation Alencon (203 miles) on a really hard racing day. At the end of the season he lifted a lot of silverware in the Federation, including: Cooper Challenge Trophy (winner longest OB race), Longest OB Race Trophy (second Combine race winner), Gazzette Perpetual Trophy (best average two longest OB races), Fred Mott Memorial Cup (best average longest OB & YB races), Late A. Knight Trophy (continental average winner) and was runner up for two other Federation trophies. It was well done to the Palmer family! The photo accompanying this tribute show Allen with his trophies and his granddaughter, Ottilie Palmer Davis, who won the OB & YB ‘Novice Trophies’ in the Esher club in the 2016 season. When Allen Palmer passed way, the sport of pigeon racing lost one of its greatest fanciers and will never been forgotten in the Surrey pigeon racing fraternity. Our sincere condolences to Jackie and the Palmer family at this very sad time. Allen Palmer RIP.
That’s it for this week! Well done to Stuart Emans on his six Federation wins in the 2025 racing season! Brilliant pigeon racing! If you win and want a write up in this space, contact me on telephone number: 07535 484584 or email me on:
TEXT & PHOTOS BY KEITH MOTT (www.keithmott.com)
