NORTH ROAD CHAMPIONSHIP CLUB
Looking back at Lerwick . . . No 4
By
George Wheatman
It is a long time since a fancier from Ipswich won the North Road Championship Club’s Blue Riband race from Lerwick. Forty-five years, in fact.
Nevertheless the 115-year history of the NRCC is inevitably interwoven with the sport of pigeon racing in the Suffolk town which boasts six winners from the Shetland Islands between 1926 and 1970.
One man who has known all of those winners is 86-year-old Peter Crawford, still a famous figure in the NRCC today after joining 60 years ago.
Although not born when the first and second Ipswich wins were recorded in 1926 and 1927, he grew up to know well the Westcott brothers William, known as Rick, and Ben and he has seen the demand for the progeny of these pre-war winning pigeons continue right until the present day.
The Westcotts have been the base of many long-distance families over all these years, and are still prominent in the consistently winning Peter Crawford loft, and still very much in demand.
Rick Westcott won the race in 1926 with a velocity of 1428ypm and, not to be outdone, amazingly his brother Ben won it the following year, when it was obviously a harder race, with the velocity of 948ypm. Flying distance in both cases was 567 miles, real distance racing.
Pigeon racing was a big sport in Ipswich in those pre-war years, and in the days after the war, and that meant keen competition, so keen, in fact, one of the Westcott’s winners was not even the best bird into the town from Lerwick that day. Another fancier took first club, first Federation with a bird not entered with the NRCC.
At the age of nine, Peter Crawford became loft boy for Ben Westcott, and recalls how different in character the two brothers were, Rick being the serious one and Ben being much more happy-go-lucky and jovial. Both, however, were outstanding fanciers, and birds from their respective lofts were much sought after. Both earned their living as boilermakers.
Another top fancier pre-war was Sid Atkins, and he proved the point by winning NRCC Lerwick in 1934. His bird was flying 566 miles and the velocity was 1257ypm in a North West wind.
There was, of course, no racing during the Second World War, but in the fourth race after the war an Ipswich fancier struck again. This time it was Sid Powling, flying 568 miles, who won a fast race in a north, north-east wind, on 1800ypm from an entry of 1461 birds.
Peter Crawford, Grandee of NRCC racing, and his wife.
Mr Crawford recalls that this winner was a blue hen which ended its career, rather ignominiously, as a feeder in another fancier’s loft.
Gentleman farmer Arthur Keeble was the next Ipswich winner, in 1955, and the velocity this time was 1221ypm. Distance to his loft was 566 miles and the race was flown in a light south-east wind.
Mr Keeble was a good water polo player, and Peter says that it was believed the fitness he gained from playing this arduous sport that enabled him to recover from the dreaded disease of anthrax.
Peter also tells the story of how he was keen to obtain a young bird off the Keeble NRCC winner (he was always looking at ways of securing offspring of Lerwick and Thurso winners) and he and his friend Wally Grantham, another outstanding Ipswich flyer, went to visit the Keeble home, and Wally was aghast at Peter’s audacious request for a youngster, so much so that he thought it was rude to put the question so bluntly.
Mr Keeble’s response was “He won’t get one if he doesn’t ask.” As it happens, there were two babies in the loft, and Peter’s “cheek” paid off because he became the owner of one of them.
In 1970 the King’s Cup came to Ipswich again, this time to the loft of J and R Brill in what was a very hard race with the winning velocity down to 731ypm. Distance to the Brill loft was 566 miles and the race was flown in a south south-east wind.
There were no birds on the day and the winner, Lady Violet, was timed early next morning. This was another Westcott pigeon and its mother was called Sparrow. Because of the Westcotts’ policy of inbreeding and line breeding, there were some small pigeons produced and Sparrow was one such bird.
Peter observes that some people thought Mr Brill was an abrasive character, but he remembers him as a straight-talking, hard-working and fair man.
He was one of the many excellent Ipswich fanciers of the time when you were regarded as a mob flyer if you sent more than two birds to Lerwick.
Many of the birds that battled through were of Westcott origins, and Peter sums these birds up as follows: “They were sloggers. They would always be there, whatever the conditions, and these were the days when most fanciers flew natural, and fed on beans and maize. I don’t know whether they would have taken to modern methods and racing on widowhood or roundabout.”
Peter has been knocking on the door in many Lerwick races but the nearest he came to winning the big race was when they were transported by air from East Midlands Airport in 1977, but they had to be brought back, because of bad weather, for liberation at Thurso. He was second in that race behind Mr and Mrs Joe Brand, of Ely.
He has had a number of section successes, however, and he remembers being second section, on one occasion, when he timed at 1-30pm on the third day.
The Westcotts are still prominent in Peter’s 24-pair loft, and nowadays he uses them to add toughness to the modern breeds he has obtained from the likes of Frank Bristow and Geoff Clare.
Conversely, he sees these introductions adding speed to the old Westcotts.
Would it not be a fitting reward for this Grandee of north road racing to win the 100th North Road Championship Club race from Lerwick on June 25th this year? One thing is for sure, he will be doing his very best to make the dream come true.
Hopefully, he will face lots of competition and you, too, could be one of the challengers if you join the NRCC.
Secretary Ray Knight will give you a warm welcome.
He can be contacted at Lynwood, Nut Lane, Old Leake, Boston, PE22 9JF; tel: 01205 871901
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Footnote: Another connection between Ipswich and the NRCC was through the Presidency.
Bob Preston was a highly respected President from 2001-2011, until health issues forced him to leave the sport.
CLICK HERE - Looking back at Lerwick..No 5
