Dagenham South Road Article 1

Wiley · June 1, 2020

Dagenham South Road Marking Station at the British Legion Beacontree

Dagenham, a suburban town in east london, famous for its industrial routes especially with the Ford Motor company, and famous for being the birth place for the greatest and only successful England football team manager that has ever lived Sir Alf Ramsay.

Pigeon wise, it has always been known to be a hot-bed of sprint and middle distance racing on the North Road, with many house hold names within the discipline of sprinting being located within the area.

However during the winter of 2018, several like minded fanciers started speaking with the view of a new challenge to bring to the area, and that is to try and create a stamp, and try and compete on the south road.

It was unanimously decided that the Thames Northern and Eastern Counties would be the club that the members would like to apply to, and thankfully we was accepted.

Starting a marking station from scratch is not an easy task, and a lot of materials and things are needed to do such a task. So from the help from a number of friends, many who where members of the Thames, a phone in auction was held, to give the club a good head-start. The members of the Dagenham marking station are extremely grateful to both the donors and buyers in the sale.

Currently the membership of the club is standing at 17 members, with many London North Road Combine, and Essex and Kent Amalgamation winners amongst its ranks. One of its standing memberships B & J Wilson even won the BICC and UBI combine, last season before the club was formed, and we are hoping as a club, some more of our members can follow in there path, by taking there north road success onto the south road. 17 members in any club in this day and age can be considered a good club, and we are hoping that we can keep building on this number. If anyone from East London or Essex has an interest in joining please dont hesitate in making contact.

Covid-19 put a stop to us ex north roaders hopes of starting the season in April. Through the group chat we was in contant contact, and giving each other any updates we had seen or heard from the RPRA. The update came for which we was all hoping for that individual and group training could take place in England, and we must thank Ian Evans and his team for the hard work that they put in to make this possible.

The members then had to thank one of the other standing members Gary White who organised for some group training to take place, with all the RPRA's guidelines being strictly adhered too.

This was then followed by another announcement that on 1st June racing can take place in England. As you can imagine the club was ecstatic about this news, especially when the Thames decided to do a group trainer from littlehampton.

Friday 29th June soon came and the basketing for the group trainer soon followed. Many members where like the photo attached of Fred Perry of Isle of Dogs praying before sending there feathered friends, as many of the members birds had never seen the coast or been that far on the south as of yet. 11 members sent to this training toss, with over 200 pigeons basketed, yet again the RPRA guidelines were all strictly adhered too.

The designated markers commented on the group chat how impressed they were with the Thames new trailer. Plenty of banter was going back and forth all evening on the Whatapp group, with everyone excited.

Saturday came and the news we was expecting with an early lib of 7.15am in a light North Wind. The banter continued, and has still continued up until i penned this article. However many reported a good race, with very few if any short, their prayers had been answered.

The club now awaits Friday 5th June when the birds will be sent to Purbeck, which was a similar distance to the ex north roaders favourite Newark, a distance to my loft of 114 miles. This will then be followed by the choice of a club race in the Thames or sending to Falaise with the BICC.

I think for many of the members the choice of racing is a big advantage, and if this was a normal year with no covid-19, the members could have the choice of racing on the south with the Thames, BICC, UBI, BBC or NFC, with some of these races all on the same weekend, which is something we as fanciers have never had on the north road.

I will keep you all updated as the weeks go on with any news of the club and pigeon racing in general.

Lastly I would like to take the opportunity from all the members to thank Dale Bagge for the use of his facilities at the Becontree Legion Club, as it has been a god send, and he has really helped the club out.

I know its been a long time since I wrote this Sayonara for now......

Grasshopper