Colchester competition - Pipeband

Final competition of our season ...  and a second visit for me to Colchester.
Sue and I set off with Bertie..  so as we did not have to leave him at home alone for a long time.
2 hours up the road we made it to the park...

A short period of warm up was interrupted by a slight people problem with one of our colleagues walking off ... never understood the root cause, but probably nothing to do with the band. So one down we went out ...  first up the G4 MSR ...  not our best performance maybe a mixture of nerves and also the issue with the missing piper.

Next up, after a break and re-tune was the G4 Marches...  a much better performance but with one down we were not expecting more than some sheets.

The final turn was the G3 Medley ...  a second go at the MSR ...  a better rendition, but we still put in enough mistakes.

Bertie did not like the multiple bands playing .. too much noise, and he wanted to get out of the arena, so whilst we were resting Sue took the time to visit the castle and park.

The mass bands was the final turn, where we slotted in .. the noise was as we expected and the speeches overly long ...  however the biggest surprise was getting a 5th in the Marches ...  

UK championships - Paisley

long journey in Steve's van Friday, all day on the field Saturday, and long journey back on Sunday ...  all for 3 mins in the competition/

It started at 7:30 when Sue took me up to the Cobham service station on the M25 to wait for Steve.. who had already picked up Jim and Karl, then around to Houndslow to pick up Iain and Sacha and head north.

A good run until the M6 where we hit road works and 50 mph limits but much slower in the queues. Meeting up with Noeleen, Billy, and David N at the hotel.

Eventually getting to Paisley after 7pm in time for dinner.  we were in the premier inn and  food came from the next door pub (meal deal with breakfast).

Sharing with Karl this time to give Steve as much rest as possible.

Next morning early breakfast and off to the parking and shuttle bus...  we were on at 10:20, but needed to do tuning and such.. also the case of the missing Gordon ..  no sound or communications from him.

tuning was the normal thing, but I think we were a bit late to advance to final tuning as it all seemed a rush ..  Gordon appearing over the horizon at the last minute.  We were rushed to the start line and this upset some balance.
On to the actual playing .. we were not as good as we should be and some big early mistakes (E not together) and some rushing (tempo was a little fast for some)
as we came off we got caught for a membership check but this also caused a bit of confusion and mis-communication ...  then we sauntered off .  Dropping the kit back to the cars/ vans so we did nto have to carry them all around.

the rest of the day was spent watching other bands, hanging around and generally looking at things. before getting the kit again for the finale ...  I was expecting a mass bands, but it was just a march past accompanied by the G1 bands.

then lots of hanging around ..  once we had the results for our division we exited (along with lots of others!)

Back to the hotel for dinner and bed. the following morning early breakfast and the long run home. On the way we passed this bus ...  future tour bus?

Jim McGinn competition - St Albans

The full band competition in St Albans...

we could scrape together enough to make it (from a piper point of view) after the defections, retirements and job related moves.

we entered the G4b - Marches, G4a - MSR, and G3 (with the MSR again). We were not playing our best but it did help the team gelling and good practice for the following weekend in Paisley (or so we thought).

we came 3rd, 3rd, and 2nd ...  that is the positive spin ...  the problem was we were last in them all, and mainly where we had let ourselves down - no big mistakes, but lots of niggles that did not separate us from the others.

the day was another long one..  starting from home at 7:30 to get to Billy's for breakfast then up to St Albans for 10am ..  as we were sharing a room we could not get in and had to practice outside..  then in and warmup followed by tuning ..

after lunch 3 performances