Darren Kelly

My name is Darren Kelly I'm from Sunderland in England I have 3 kids Melissa,Lee, and Travis...currently single and plenty of time for the birds.
I've been around pigeons since I can remember...my dad and brothers kept and raced pigeons.
I was first introduced to the sport of tipplers around 1999 by brother Robert...he introduced me to Tony Veater...who I became good friends with and spent a lot of time watching how he trained and prepared his birds for competitions.

I was starting to get hooked. I just wanted to get started and flying on the competition side...I was taking anybodies ybs to cross settle in 2000 which I was grateful for.

I ended off with 6 birds cross settled to take to the 2001 as old birds for my novice season. I had 5 birds cross settled for the start of 2001 old bird season. I cross settled 6 ready for my novice season in 2001.
I spoilt 1 which left me with 4...which I flew over the 4 old bird competitions 15hrs plus 16hrs plus 19hrs plus and the highlight of that season 20hrs 2min still kitted was something else.

In 2001 I decided to into to the cross Bodens I bought my first 2 from Eric Anslow first year of crossing them to pilots I took ybs to dark and missed them twice...dropping ybs on 18.40 after disqualification I knew it was in them...I then met Dave Black that year...where we done couple of swaps with the Bodens...I was fortunate to get 2 clay hens which Mac Donald pigeons from Tex Brooks...and after crossing them in 2004 I flew my first 18hrs with ybs...and on the following fly I missed 1 and dropped the 2 on 18.30...those same batch of ybs were brought out the following year as 6 yearlings I spoilt 1 in training...which left me 5 and what a 5 they became...they were disqualified first old bird national a minute over time allowed to trap them...I knew they were probably too fit for the shorter comps ANd still full of flying...so along came the second old bird....I was struggling for a ref...so I thought I would feed up from the Monday and fly the Saturday for my own pleasure...in the mean time I got a ref...bearing I had never fed up from a Monday....out they went for our 2nd old bird national.

Perfect weather a light breeze these 5 yearling hens went about like ybs enjoying themselves going raking for 30 to 40 minutes from late morning to mid afternoon...I was never expecting what was to come...coming towards dark they were cruising nothing changed in this kits style but not raking away for as long...by now I had 3 NTU members and 2 ex NTU members watching and enjoying this kit of 5 hens 5 refs and through week I couldn't get

Yours in Sport

D. Kelly