I believe Young birds need some form of training/schooling to instil in them what the game is about, older birds exercising well around the loft don't need as much before racing begins. A member of our club done the same at the weekend, sending 5 birds (2 yearlings and 3 2yr olds) to the first race 100mls with forecast being strong S/easterly winds 25-30mls mph. Both the yearlings have been trained to 35-40mls and the older 3 were just lifted from the loft. A lot of birds have failed to return possibly due to the S/easterly winds which were in their favour flying into the N/west, the Open winner was won into Derry. The club mate in question got the 3 older untrained birds and never seen the yearlings that had been trained.