LEICESTERSHIRE NOTES
by John Ghent
Leicester Continental Club 2016 Preview
The night of Friday April 8th saw club members and fellow fanciers gather at The Old Aylestone Club for the 3rd presentation evening of the Leicester Continental Club, which was once again tied in with a superb panel evening. The guests this year were Ray Strawbridge and Gareth Watkins of BICC fame and Drew Callan from the NFC who had come along to present our prizes.
"The Panel"
The club had decided to try something a little different this year as we normally sell a fair amount of young birds on the night but it was decided that this was a lot to squeeze into one evening so we would have a phone in sale instead. Well, what a great decision that has turned out to be! We have sold 22 lots for in excess of £1,300 which not only allows the club to fly for some great prizes but also put some money bank to look towards future ventures which I shall elaborate on shortly.
Our "crowd" for the evening
The presentation night was the main reason we were all gathered at the Old Aylestone and so that is where we shall start! The prizes were very well shared out this year compared to 2014 when Mick Lennon ran away with it. Mick could only manage 5th in our Super League this year but was still in with a chance of winning it with just 1 race left, that was how close things were.
Taking top spot in the Super League this year was John Murphy, his Bordeaux performance was truly stunning, clocking two birds late in the day to take 1st and 2nd in our Blue Riband race and etch his name onto the Super League trophy and also The Thurso Cup which is presented for most combined points at the two longest races.
Drew Callan and Super League Winner John Murphy
We were very pleased to attract some new members this year and one of those, Johnny Gilbert, produced a sensational season to finish 2nd in the Super League, with the Gateley partnership and Jerry Wright completing the top 4 ahead of the aforementioned Micky Lennon. This is a great time to mention two other new members, Chris Watts and Rob Glover. Outstanding performances throughout the season from both flyers meant they were right up there until the very end and pulled some really good prize money also. Chris has only been back in the sport a few years and has developed an excellent team for racing in the Midland National. Rob's season was built on a solid foundation of knowing his pigeons extremely well; he was successful in several of the single bird nomination races, not an easy task in local federation racing, let alone National racing over several hundred miles! Well done to both of you! A couple of fanciers couldn't make the presentation and one of those, again another new member, Sturgess, Son and Grandson, had a superb young bird season and a really pulled themselves up to be very close to the Top 10 in the Super League which is where everybody is striving for!
Drew Callan and Johnny Gilbert 2nd in the Super League - Drew Callan and Tom Gateley 3rd in the Super League
As you will see from the photographs we had a very well supported night which makes all the hard organisational work worthwhile. We once again had our own sound engineer to get all the PA system, well done to Gaz Marsh for the effort you put in. It was a brilliant feeling to have my daughter Lacey asking me if she could come along and I am glad I relented as she was a huge help to my self and Alistair Ewart, collecting all the ticket money and then doing a super job selling all the raffle tickets, we even had to open another book she sold that many!
Chris Watts - Derek Leitch - Jerry Wright
Mick Lennon - Rob Glover - Mick Lovell
Drew Callan and Tad Truszowski of Crossley and Truszowski a rare photo of camera shy Tad! - Alistair Ewart
So onto the 2016 season and what a season it promises to be. With the fund raising so far and entry fees we have over £2,200 to currently fly for and we have only had 12 members registered for this year's competition, madness if you ask me! A few new members will get us close to the £3,000 mark. Ultimately though it is not just about the money, it's about competing against your mates in the same area under the umbrella of the Midland National Flying Club. We know that there are several fanciers within the radius of the club that would have done very well just based on results that we have noticed over the last 2 years, it's here if you want it!
Now, in all honesty we don't need to have a certain amount of members to make our club functional as there is no real cost involved in the running of the Continental Club. Due to this we are able to look to the future and ways in which we can move pigeon racing forward in this area, we have lots of ideas which we are hoping will come to fruition in the coming years, it is not just all about the next 12 months in the Leicester Continental Club. Despite me stating earlier we don't need a certain number of members to function, if the club did get up to 20-25 members then we could really move things forward very quickly indeed. So again, with that in mind, we have taken some feedback from local fanciers who are NOT members and asked them why? What could we do to encourage more interest? How can we make this work for more flyers? Well one thing that we are looking to implement soon is our own club website. This would mean that we could upload results, race programmes, information and news, photographs and other articles and would allow us to streamline the administration and cut down on postage as well. The next thing is to really increase the appeal to a wider range of fancier, a fancier that prides themselves on the selection of their pigeon. We currently have two results, one of which is known as the Main Race where your first two birds count, no nomination required, and we pay the first 10 places in the result. In this result you earn points for the Super League. None of that will change as it has worked very well; we are however going to give some more prestige to the Single Bird Nomination that runs alongside what has been known as the Main Race in the past. The prize money on offer is actually more significant for the winners in the Single Bird Nomination, what we are now going to do is to give points for the birds in this race also, to be added to your points in the other race in the hunt for the Super League Trophy.
The Nomination part of the competition will now be known as the Gold Race and the race where your first two birds count will be known as the Silver Race. Rest assured that coverage for both races will still be strong, we just want to give members the recognition they deserve for selecting their single pigeon in each race. Once we know exactly how many members we have for this coming season the full prize list on offer for the Gold Races, the Silver Races and the Super League will be released in the fancy press.
For more information and membership enquiries please contact John Ghent
on 07510 866515
or email
