“ON THE ROAD” WITH KEITH MOTT.
The late Ian Crammond & Nigel Langstaff of Fontwell.
The late Ian Crammond and his pigeon partner, Nigel Langstaff, were house hold names in our sport in the UK and had won many firsts in Federation, Combine, Classic and National over many years. I’m taking you back to the 2008 season for this article, my last year of nine as L&SECC convoyer. Ian and Nigel were terrific workers for the Classic and recorded their third L&SECC winner from Bergerac that season.
My assistant convoyer for the last old bird race of the 2008 season from Bergerac was my good late mate, Brian Goodwin, and I must say he had worked out of his skin for the three Classic races he had covered with me that season. The life of a pigeon convoyer is a very hard one and Brian had done a brilliant job as my assistant, in spite of his recent health problems. This was his last race, but told me at the time that he really enjoyed the experience, especially going to Tarbes. We dropped off empty baskets at the marking stations the day before marking and I had the great pleasure of meeting up with my long standing friends, Mike and Edna Shepherd, at the Stevenage marking station. Mike is one of my oldest friends in the sport and is my ‘mentor’, being the man who pushed me on with my pigeon articles in the early 1970’s. It’s had been a few years since we had met up and was really nice to see them both!
The 1,100 L&SECC birds were liberated at Bergerac in a no wind situation at 05.30hrs and was won by the very successful south coast loft of Ian Crammond & Nigel Langstaff of Fontwell. To say the partners had a good season in 2008 would be an understatement, winning many premier positions right threw from Federation to National level, including: 1st open L&SECC Bergerac, 2nd open NFC Angers, 3rd L&SECC Tours and 4th open BBC Bordeaux. Brilliant pigeon racing! Ian and Nigel recorded their third L&SECC win in the mid-July race and about two weeks after the event, Peter Taylor and I picked a nice summer’s day to make the 60 miles drive down to Fontwell to see the Bergerac winning pigeon. Ian Crammond was famous in the pigeon racing fraternity for his wonderful loft set which is sited on his rare breeds farm near Fontwell Race Course, just a couple of miles from Bognor, on the south coast. I had visited the farm many times over the years, but never tire of viewing the partner’s great lofts and pigeons. The partner’s Bergerac Classic winner was their three year old champion Gaby Vandenabeele blue chequer cock, ‘Crackerjack’ and he was a M. & D. Evans pigeon, being a grandson of ‘Eisenhower’. Nigel told me at the time that he was named ‘Crackerjack’ because he was crackers and was very mad around the loft. After being clocked on the day to win the L&SECC Bergerac race in 2008, he was sent back to the NFC race from Saintes (353 miles) and recorded 3rd section A, 84th open. ‘Crackerjack’ had the best velocity of the six organizations (3,442 birds) liberate off the CSCFC transporter at Bergerac that day and won the RPRA Southern Region Award for best individual performance up to 450 miles. He was bred from a long line of good winning pigeons and his full brother won 1st section NFC St. Malo.
Ian Crammond had been in the sport 60 years and had 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 told me at the time that the partners had several families going well at that time including the M. & D. Evans / Vandenabeele, Peter Van Osch and Emil Dennys. He had had his present loft set up at Fontwell about 14 years and had taken Nigel on as a full pigeon partner in recent seasons. Ian couldn’t praise Nigel enough, saying he was a first class pigeon man and was mostly responsible for their outstanding racing success in the 2008 season. Ian liked 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 joyed as he had made some good friends of fanciers from over the English Channel. When he went out to obtain new stock he always went to lofts that were winning consistently with very big birdage in the National and Combine races. Ian said years ago he enjoyed long distance racing and did not mind waiting several days to clock a bird from Spain, but in later seasons he only likes one day racing, up to about 550 miles.
The partners raced 120 cocks on the widowhood system and these racers were split in to two teams, one for sprint to middle distance and the other for long distance. The racers were 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 liked racing out to places like Bordeaux and Saintes, but his ambition was to win 550 miles National race. The partner’s long distance loft was the focal centre of the magnificent set up and Ian called it ‘master control’. It was about 50ft long, with a corridor where the birds trap into off landing boards and all the nest boxes were self-cleaning, with the fronts being colour coded to each section. The loft had 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 was on ETS. Ian said the long distance loft was the product of many year of work altering it to get it right. The sprinting widowhood cocks were housed in 50ft loft with a pan tiled roof, open door trapping and is totally closed in. Ian’s pride and joy was his magnificent stock loft and flights, which housed over 100 pairs of breeders that had been obtained from the very best continental champions over the years. The partners liked to pair the stock birds up early in the year and each family had its own section in the loft.
Ian and Nigel bred about 300 youngsters every season and sold 100 of them, with the rest being retained for racing. They were all put on the ‘dark’ system and raced natural to the perch. The young bird loft was 40ft long, with open door trapping and on race days the birds went down to a small door at low level, so they can be registered on the ETS system. If the weather was good the babies were trained from Southampton, which was a 40 minute fly, five days a week and were raced out to the longest NFC and BBC young bird race points. The partners didn’t break the youngsters down and fed them the same widowhood mixture as the old birds. Nigel told me at the time, that he used to enjoy only old bird racing, but later days seems to enjoy his young bird racing more.
Other premier racers at the Fontwell loft at that time were: ‘The Van Osch Cock’ – This wonderful five year old blue chequer cock looked and handled like a show pigeon, with beautiful feather, balance in the hand and pearl eye. The Van Osch pigeons are a Dutch family, being Janssen based and are winning well for Ian and Nigel. This widowhood cock recently won 1st open BICC Exeter (1966 birds). ‘Son of Eisenhower’ – This five year old champion blue white flight cock is one of the premier widowhood racers at the Fontwell loft today, winning 2nd open L&SECC Wadebridge, 2nd open BICC Exeter and 4th open L&SECC Bordeaux. A brilliant racer! ‘The Tours Cock’ – This three year old blue cock won 3rd open L&SECC Tours in the 2008 season. ‘The 38 Cock’ – Another brilliant three year old and this blue chequer cock won 1st section A, 71st open NFC Saintes (353 miles) in 2008. ‘The JT Mealy Cock’ – This handsome long distance cock is from the Eric Cannon bloodlines obtained from John Tyerman of Bracklesham Bay and at time of our visit to the loft was being prepared to go to BICC Perpignan International marking that same evening. He had flown Tarbes (550 miles) twice, being clocked on the day of liberation with the L&SECC and was clocked from Perpignan, too complete 2,000 miles racing in the 2008 season.
Well that’s it for this week! I hope my readers have enjoyed this look back at the wonderful performances of the late Ian Crammond. He was a lovely man and brilliant pigeon racer! I can be contacted with any pigeon matters on telephone number: 07535 484584 or email me on:
TEXT & PHOTOS BY KEITH MOTT (www.keithmott.com)
