Last year the associations Suceava and Botoșani engaged more than 24,000 pigeons in the first stage of the season, thus setting an absolute record, this year, pigeon fanciers from the same two groups broke their own record. Launched from the same town as last season, Janow (Poland), the first Long distance competition in 2020 for Botoșani and Suceava associations had 25,770 pigeons at the start and a participation of 646 fanciers. The coveted 1st place on the launch was won by Cristian Gheorghe, from Șcheia, Suceava County, and for fanciers, the first position in the ranking was occupied by Daniel Mirăuță, from Volovăț, Suceava.

The Janow Long distance competition took place on June 20, and the release of the pigeons from the 12 trucks that transported them to the launch place was at 05:10. In terms of distances, the competition was quite diverse, with the participating pigeon fanciers having between 550 and 640 km from the launch spot.

Cristian Gheorghe wins the 1st place out of 25,770 pigeons with a yearling hen

The big winner of this super long distance competition, comparable in participation to the traditional stages in Belgium or the Netherlands, is a young hen, in her first season of competitions. It belongs to the pigeon fancier from Suceava Cristian Gheorghe, who holds in his record several national trophies, won in the Long distance and Marathon categories. Because it was purchased from a Romanian pigeon fancier established in Germany for four decades, the winning hen has the series DV-3303-34 / 2019. For her, the Janow competition had 588 km, a distance she covered in almost eight hours of flight, reaching the loft at 12:47:47. The average speed recorded was 1,284 m / min, which proves that it wasn’t an easy competition at all. “My name is Cristian Gheorghe and I am from Șcheia, Suceava County. I have been competing since 2007, and my most important results came in 2018, the season in which I won the 1st place National Yearlings Marathon, the 3rd place National Yearlings Long distance and the 3rd place National Ace Yearlings Long distance. I only compete in widowhood and I participate in all stages, regardless of the distance category. I engaged 58 pigeons for this race. My plan was to prepare this race in particular, because I did not hope that the pigeons would perform so well for me in the stages in the country. The winning hen was purchased last year from a 40-year-old friend in Germany and, because there were problems with the pigeons competing with foreign rings, as a youngster she competed just a race from Sighetu Marmației. The main families found in her pedigree are Koopman and Gaby Vandenabeele. Regarding the preparation of the pigeons, I can say that I use the Versele Laga food, especially the Champion Plus mixture, and between stages I try to take them to one or two training sessions of 50-60 km “, Cristian Gheorghe detailed. No less remarkable was the result achieved by Daniel Mirăuță, also a member of the Pigeon Association Suceava, the one who won, at this stage, the 1st place in fanciers’ competition. Of the 69 pigeons engaged by Daniel Mirăuță for this race, 24 managed to rank it. The 107th and 116th places on the launch were occupied by his first two team pigeons, the achieved coefficient being 8.65 penalty points.