What a weekend that was...a battle at the cutting edge between two very good friends and we are talking about family Van Oeckel and family Broeckx. When we walked into Bart and Nance Van Oeckel's kitchen to congratulate them on their 6th national win, it didn't surprise us for a second that the Broeckx family also joined us at the impressive kitchen table to celebrate. Because it is an open secret that both families give each other everything. There is no question of envy...but Bart immediately adds...next time it will be up to Marleen and Jan Broeckx to take the national victory. Everyone wishes it to them so wholeheartedly."

Returning once more to the millimetre sprint. Both lofts play a distance of 700km on Limoges and the difference in speed was correctly counted 0.30m/m or 3 seconds. Curious as we were, we asked both of them if either of these pigeons had "one tour too many" or something "lingered too long" to come in. 
Jan Broeckx "ours did 3 big revolutions before diving towards the drop board". 
Bart Van Oeckel "our pigeon didn't see anyone coming. Suddenly a bolt round the loft, up the board and in. It all happened so quickly that we doubted she was registered. Caretaker Kjenten sprinted into the loft and from inside held them over the shelf once more. Apparently, she was not registered in the first place." 

Pigeons performing not motivating

The 2024 season is running on wheels at the Van Oeckel home. Three weeks ago they won the 2nd National Vivonne and a number of pigeons are super ranked in various "provisional" ace pigeon competitions so the Van Oeckel team cannot afford to let a stitch drop. 
Bart, Nance and minder Kjenten are going to have to keep an eye on every detail, are going to have to play damn close to the ball and leave nothing to chance because the next few weeks are going to be crucial in winning numerous competitions. 

When asked if the national winner was specially motivated, we got the following answer: "Our winner is played on the pure widowhood system. The previous races did not always run smoothly and despite her strong performances in previous seasons, this season did not run as smoothly. She flew Quievrain as preparation, Noyon twice and then Quievrain again. On Bourges she won the 337th Nat. against 12,094 pigeons and on Sancoins the 378th National against 9,753 pigeons. On Vivonne, she missed the result. We felt she was not motivated enough and for that reason we left her with her partner for 2 days after Vivonne. They were only separated for feeding and training. For the rest, they were allowed to cuddle each other constantly. Whether this all helped, I don't know but my experience has already taught me that you should leave pigeons - that perform strongly without motivation - alone. Once I thought I would make them perform even better by pulling out the "box of tricks", but that always went wrong. 

With a good pigeon in form that does not really reach the top of the result, that extra motivation can help and maybe this happened last weekend.

B22-6062552
1st National Limoges 6,889 old birds

Distance: 700km

Velocity: 1,626.53 m/m

1st National Limoges 6,889 old birds
1st Sermaises 815b.
2nd Melun 1,038b.
3rd Quievrain 959b.
15th Noyon 635b.
15th Noyon 447b.
337th Nat. Bourges 12,094b.
378th Nat. Sancoins 9,753b. 

Stefan Mertens