The days when would be participants to one loft races would have a quick look around their loft and pick out a few youngsters "which had been sitting there", are long past. Today, when you are competing in South Africa against the best of the best out of almost 30 countries on a total playing field of between 3000 and 5000 pigeons, you need to send top performers if you want to stand a chance. In other words, just grabbing a few youngsters is the equivalent of throwing 1000 USD down the drain. And you can be sure of one thing: successful businessmen like Martyn Mitchell hate throwing money down the drain or they wouldn't have come as far as he has.

Small wonder then that when I asked Jayne Mitchell about their Hot Spot 5 car winner "Hand of Peace" she let me know this fantastic performer was actually bred especially to compete in South Africa's Million Dollar Race. "Hand of Peace"'s sire is already sire of 2 x 1st National and the dam is a daughter of 2 x 1st National. An impressive record list is the result: For starters "Hand of Peace" has been the first Belgian pigeon twice (Training 8, 5 January and Hot Spot 5, 12 January). It has taken over the first position in the Belgian Superstar Competition from the seemingly invincible "Hoshi", who held that ranking for 15 training races in a row (out of a current total of 20!). It positioned itself in the top 100 8 times (23rd, 33rd, 27th, 42nd, 40th, 71st, 75th and 1st) and 12 times in the top 250 (adding an 117th, 140th, 231st and 227th). And of course it has won Hot Spot 5, bringing Martyn and Jayne 6000 USD in prizemoney plus a motorcar: an exclusive Saab 9-3 convertible, which Jayne picked out at Baltic Motors in Zwijnaarde.

In any case Martyn Mitchell is not a fancier to leave anything up to coincidence. Over the years he has built himself a worldwide reputation as a breeder and selector of racing pigeons.He started keeping racing pigeons more than 35 years ago in the UK. His Janssen based birds won him something like 50 first prizes each year and earned him the Queen's Cup from Lerwick no less than 3 times in the '70ies. Martyn certainly was and is a keen fancier, ahead of his times: more than 20 years ago he was already experimenting with the darkening system, getting extraordinary results with his young birds. After a period of great success on short and middle distance in the 1980ies, he decided in 1990 to shift his attention to the long distance races. To this end he formed his now famous "Targa" family: his "Targa Classique" was honoured as the Best Long Distance Pigeon in the UK at the age of three in 1996 and as 1st Acepigeon Northern Classic and Queen's Coronation Cup winner for 1st Long Distance Ace Pigeon UK.

In 2004 Martyn and Jayne decided to move to Belgium and found their spot in Hulste, in the West Flanders Province, in Martyn's own words: "the Mecca of the pigeon sport in Belgium". His ambition: none other than winning a Belgian First National. To this end he filled his new lofts with descendants of countless 1st National Winners and Ace pigeons. For anyone who doubts he is not only willing but also able to fullfill his ambition, we publish his results of 2007 and the prizes won by his pigeons from 1997 to 2007:

Results 2007:

18 x 1st Regional, 3 x 1st Provincial, 2 x 1st Interprovincial, 1st semi-National, 3rd National (very close!)
93 times in top 10 Regional, 15 times in the top 10 Provincial, 8 times in the top 10 Interprovincial, 2 times in the top 10 semi-National and 1 time in the top 10 National.

1997 to 2007 Martyn Mitchell pigeons won:

11 1st Nationals, 8 1st Semi-Nationals, 66 1st Provincials, 302 times in the top 100 National and Semi-National and 311 times in the top 10 Provincial.

With this background in mind, does anyone find it odd if we tip "Hand of Peace" as one of the potential winners of this year's Million Dollar Race? Watch out for this astonishing pigeon on February 2!

Text: Frank Daelemans
Picture: August Daelemans