THE HARDEST RACE ROUTES INTO THE UK PART 4
Further thoughts from Alan Baker
When I saw Gareth Rankin was suggesting the route into Scotland was the hardest I have to say my feeling was no not possible. However Gareth brought up some points which certainly made me think.
The initial thought was regarding temperature and his reference to the drop in temperature and I would say this point does not support Gareth's argument. On a hot summer's day cooling of temperature in the last 50/100 miles is of help to the bird, I would have thought? Compare that with a Barcelona pigeon hitting the French coast at 2000hrs with the temperature blazing all day through Spain & France and still perhaps 24 degrees. I understand the pigeon's body temperature does not alter, providing it is well covered in feather so it should not feel heat or cold (providing it's not extreme). However it does dehydrate and fluid is very important. A pigeon flying from Spain in mid summer compared to one flying form Tours I would suggest has it harder temperature wise and will dehydrate far more, especially if the temperature drops to the end of the day flight from Tours so markedly. So I would suggest this is not the hindrance to the Scottish route compared to those being liberated much further south.
As to the hills, mountains and hawks, surely it is no different to flying from Lerwick down to South Wales, at the home end. When I lived at the top end of the valleys, Pen Y Fan was 12 miles north of my loft at 2,900ft and the Brecon Beacon range, which Pen Y Fan is part of, runs directly across the Valleys. And the Beacons have quite an effect on the Welsh birds. Invariably the birds will come down the eastern edge of the valleys down Abergavenny to Pontypool and then work across the middle of the valleys. It was a great problem for fanciers at the top end of the Valleys, so much so for example that in 1971 the Merthyr club with 69 lofts split and a new club was formed at the Gurnos with 31 lofts, not because of animosity or because of exclusion reasons but because the northern end lofts wanted some genuine competition among themselves. I remember talking to the late great Taffy Bowen about this in the late 70s early 80s. He was saying it had always been a problem. In the Blaenrhondda club at the top end of the Rhondda under the Rhigos they tried a rule where first in the clock was the winner regardless of distance. That did not work; fanciers living 10 miles down the valley were first in the clock and meanwhile the top-enders’ birds had a further 10 mile to fly back up!
Hawks? Well I don't want to get into a debate about whose got the most hawks, one Percy is one too many for our birds’ health; but there were several resident pairs above Cefn Coed in the mid 80s and I understand the problem now is extreme. They were regular hunters over the top end of Merthyr but the fanciers from Cardiff and adjoining valleys tended to train their birds from Storey Arms to try and get them to come on line through the Beacons. I'm sure their birds provided respite for Merthyr birds. In Devon I have a resident pair in a working quarry a mile from my loft, and 6 miles south in a near line I understand there are 3 pairs. This past year I only flew four or five races because of circumstance but in my first training toss, about 12 miles ESE at Honiton, I lost my good cock - 3 times Tarbes (556 miles) including 78th Open NFC, and my Blue cock - 2 x 1st Section Devon & Cornwall Combine and 4th & 20th section NFC all Tarbes came back ripped from the same toss. I lost him his first race after recovery! I found out later it’s not a good spot to let them go as there is another resident pair close by! If you live on the west of the UK you will have big problems regardless of location or route.
After mulling the above through my mind I wondered what constitutes a tough route. After all, Gareth's friend who is exiled in the English Midlands claims you can not compare 500 mile racing in England as it's much easier. Why would it be so much easier? Well I suppose there is flatter land to negotiate but I would expect, like the Welsh birds, the Scottish birds would manoeuvre around the hills anyway. So why? Well I assume we are comparing like with like, MNFC as opposed to SNFC. The first thing that struck me was the difference in birdage in 2011 – the MNFC’s 1521 birds for their longest race and the SNFC’s 236 birds for Tours. I was surprised at such a low Scottish birdage and from that point on my perspective changed completely! One of the main reasons for me why Barcelona is the toughest race route in the UK is the huge birdage going to mainland NW Europe and the tiny comparative birdage of the UK convoy. And here we have the same a convoy over 6 times the size of the SNFC convoy. The exile is right, it has to be easier to fly into the Midlands with convoy size compared to Scotland. In fact I am in awe of that small band of 110 fanciers who entered the Tours race. It is almost statistically a two bird race from 551 mile for the shortest flyer on the result to 708 miles for 3 fanciers on the result. WOW! 708 miles for a '2 bird' race. Now that is what I call some performance. All 3 fanciers were in Peterhead: Maskame & Mackie vel 913, Jim Donaldson vel 747 (interestingly with a g.son of Jim Emerton's Barcelona Dream) and D Hay vel 740. What great pigeons. What great fanciers! What does that mean in terms of this discussion? Does it make the route the toughest route? Well no not in my opinion, even though the Peterhead birds have flown a fantastic race.
How do we decide on toughness? Is it flying in adverse weather? Is it flying over inhospitable terrain? Is it flying into hawk infested areas? Where I now fly now in Devon I believe is the 'toughest' place I've flown but what do I mean? Well when I flew in Barnsley it was the easiest in terms of returns but the toughest in terms of competition With 5,000 coming into the Barnsley area on a Saturday afternoon the competition was fantastic with seconds between the first in the club with me many minutes behind! But where I am now in the NFC, my birds at Tarbes invariably have a 100 mile dog-leg and have to run peregrine alley along the Jurassic coastline.
I think from my perspective the 3 main characters of the toughest routes are the prevailing winds at the time of the longest classic races, the size of the whole convoy and the size of the convoy to your area and the distance, and lastly I will always feel the longer the distance, the tougher the route!
The one thing all this has highlighted for me is it doesn't matter which route you fly, you can only compete on the chosen route and the area you live in. It often follows because you live in an area with a tough route that it is claimed you have the finest fanciers. There is no logic to such argument. I think Gareth should be rightly proud of where he flies and the reputation of his late father and himself because of their outstanding performances where they live. It is an irrelevance how hard the route is except that where ever you live, if you fly in the Classic/National Clubs available, you will be flying the toughest route you can! But for me the number one will always be Barcelona in the Innernational.
Could I finish by saying congratulations to Mick McGrevy winning the Jim Emerton Trophy at 850+ mile - fantastic; a man I always think of as the 'salt of the earth', a straighter and kinder man you'll not meet. Well done Mick.
