The REAL champs
The Internet has also changed pigeon sport a lot.
Through the Internet an American had learned about the results of let me call him, Mr. Black.
'This guy must have fantastic birds' he e-mailed me.
'Why do you think so?' I asked him.
He had seen the following results on the internet.
Some of them were:
598 birds: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
494 birds: 1, 3, 4, 6, 7
422 birds: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.
I was impressed, those were fantastic results indeed, but what surprised me was that I had never heard about that Mr. Black.
But coincidentally a fancier that I know lives close to him and I asked him if Mr. Black was really that good!?
'This is the best joke I ever heard. I have the official results and I will post them' he
laughed.
One day later I got them.
Now the American had results by Brown from the internet, I had the official and complete result sheets. And those were 2 different stories.
UNBELIEVABLE.
I looked at the result of the first race.
The entry of 598 birds was correct, but what did I also see?
On top it said: 'Birds entered by 4 fanciers'.
I saw Mr. Black alone had entered 239 birds.
The second race was even worse.
494 birds entered by' THREE fanciers.
What a champion this man was!
'Was he stupid, smart or did he fool himself?' I asked myself.
Maybe he was smart, since foreigners fell for the results and Mr. Black, the big joke in the Federation, but the champion mob flier in his mini club made nice money.
The origin of his birds was 'Janssen'.
Or what else do you think?
A SHAME
Black did not lie or cheat but his results should never have been published the way they were.
When results are published in magazines in Holland and Belgium it is always mentioned how many birds the fancier entered.
And it should be like that, as readers have the right to be correctly informed.
But foreigners do not have these magazines!
The REAL champions are often people that hardly race a handful of birds against whom the big shots with the great names dare not pool money.
If a Dutchman or a Belgian wants to become famous abroad he has 2 choices:
a.
Race long distance.
b.
Race middle distance with very many birds.
Naturally the press here also has its defects.
A man that wins 30 prizes in a race gets all the attention, even though he entered 100 birds or more.
A man that only enters a handful of birds remains anonymous, regardless the result.
Some time ago Mr. Brown won 2nd and 3rd (from 1,100 birds) with only 2 birds in the race, but what happened a week later?
The 'sensational result' of a fellow sportsman in the same race was described in the press.
He won 5, 9, 10, 11, 12, 24, 37, and 51 and so on; He had won 32 prizes total of 78 birds he entered.
So 46 birds failed!
Brown was not mentioned at all though he had all his birds home before the mob flier even had one from 78.
And believe me, there are many fanciers like Brown.
'We' know this because we see complete results.
And complete results are what you need to judge the strength of a loft.
Furthermore it is from those unknown people with super birds where the Big Names go if they want to improve their family.
EXAMPLES
A nice example of what I mean is William Geerts, who recently passed away.
His birds made him world famous in the 80-ies.
He had got them from the completely unknown Fonske Jacobs.
Another example is what happened to me last year.
We race 1 per 4, so if the entry is 800 birds, 200 prizes are to be won.
The first 5 prize winners are published on a regional television station.
A fellow fancier said:
'Mr Blue was super again, wasn't he? I saw on the telly that he won 2nd and 4thand it was not your race was it? I did not see your name?'
Mr Blue had won 2nd and 4th indeed, but' had entered 69 birds and won 29 prizes.
This was not my race?
My name was not on the telly indeed but I won 7, 11 and 17 (against 800 birds) of 3 bids that I entered.
I am afraid I will never be famous indeed.
But who cares?
Definitely not me!