Medieval conditions (27-01-25)
Billiards would be a revival in the Netherlands. More and more people are signing up for a club and the reason would be: Attention on TV. The same with fishermen. There is even a special TV channel for them. It was a reason for some to buy a fishing rod. Darts another thing. Attention in the media increases interest. The newspapers stopped paying attention to pigeon sport. It explains why, in the Netherlands more than in Belgium, more and more people say they have no idea that pigeon sport (still) exists.
IMAGE
People who are informed often have a distorted picture. People know that: 'A sport for old men in dustcoats with cap on their heads and an own made cigarette in their mouths.' It is true that you still get young, mostly professional practitioners, but still. For too long, pigeon sport has stood still. For too long, too little happened. Some things you can no longer take seriously in 2025.
RESULTS
-Take Barcelona. Dutchman T Koele caused a spectacle by clocking three pigeons in the night that won an International 1st, 2nd and 3rd prize, but not in the top five nationally (The Netherlands). It has to do with different calculations of speeds made, but can you still speak of a full-fledged sport if different organizations use different standards?
-A fancier from the Middle East felt flattered because he had related pigeons to Luc van Mechelen’s National Ace Pigeon. On the Internet he searched how many points that NATIONAL Ace pigeon was ahead in the club, because that had to be a lot. To his great surprise, he did not come across the pigeon in the club.
-Sabrina Brugmans, another thing. 'Her' 1st National Ace pigeon KBDB was not provincial Ace.
-My 191 won 5 firsts in big races. In the worst case, it could end up ex aequo for National Ace Pigeon. I thought, because winning earlier than a 1st prize is not possible. She came second.
Best of the Netherlands was a pigeon that was beaten by my pigeon in every race (provincial!!). But he played in a different Fed. Everything was ok according to the rules, but for an 'Ace pigeon title' to be beaten by a pigeon that you beat every week? It is as difficult to explain as it is to digest.
FREEDOM
Belgians love freedom and pigeon fanciers even more. They don't like to be curtailed. That explains the completely ridiculous group liberations.
Releasing a group of often less than 1,000 pigeons every ten minutes for an hour and a half, is asking for a kind of pigeons that is inferior in the long term.
Do you want to build up a kind of inferior pigeons? Then you have to release in small groups with all the same final destination. 'Street by street' as you sometimes hear is exaggerated, 'village by village' comes close.
Is that 'striving for pigeons that are able to break from the rest?'
I prefer pigeons that manage to break away from a group of 30,000 in a large distribution area. Pigeons from 'the cradle of the sport' are already enough lost in One Loft Races worldwide. For me the federation can act: No releases of about less than 1,000 pigeons for OFFICIAL races. But I fear little support.
MEDIEVAL
Barcelona 2024 was ridiculous and so are the calculations of championships, which vary from 'club to club'. If you want to explain to someone how you have to perform to become champion, you first have to explain to him where you live and in which club you are going to play. Because two clubs from the same place with completely different calculations of points is almost normal
WIND PLAYERS
Belgium is also the country of so called ‘wind players’.
Some can play in up to 10 different clubs and in three provinces every weekend. When there is a westerly wind, they play in a club where they live all the way east. Wouldn't be so bad if everyone could do that, but that's not the case.
Pierre Beyl had a youngster that performed unbelievably. It became National Ace Pigeon. Yet Johan de Langhe has a youngster with an even lower coefficient. I know that because I am the proud breeder of both parents. However, that pigeon with the even lower coefficient has no chance because her prizes have been won in different clubs. Nevertheless, the KBDB had intervened well with this measure.
ESPECIALLY UNFAIR:
All those different racing programs also raise eyebrows. For example, the province of Antwerp team has two sprint races on Sunday. So two possibilities to score for provincial and national titles.
Elsewhere they only have ONE sprint race per weekend and elsewhere they can race sprint on both Saturday and Sunday.
I don't want to talk about the pool systems that can differ from club to club, but what would the sport seem more mature if they had the same method everywhere.
DECEPTIVE
Several times I wasted time reading a report about someone who had simply performed poorly. This was also the case recently. The man in question had won 4 prizes out of more than 30 birds, including a 1st prize.
4 from over 30 is very bad.
I really don't need to know how a man feeds or trains who has been proving for years that he is a loser.
Only because of that lucky victory he has been granted publicity, but it should not be about his guidance. By the way, speaking of publicity. I was just impressed when I read the prize percentages of pigeons from a 'champion'. Pigeons with 12 prizes out of 12 participations, 14 out of 14, 10 out of 10, he had plenty of them. Until I saw a 140th prize out of 322 pigeons and I got it. There 50% of the birds entered won a prize. Forgetting to mention this or wanting to mislead?
DUTY
In every sport, it is the duty of policymakers to ensure as much equal opportunities as possible. So there is plenty of work in Belgium.
As if I am the connoisseur...