Our two big highlights last week were victories of different circumstances but both equally as pleasing. On Friday at Romford Baroness Bullet led Home a 1-2 as she scored a superb victory over kennelmate Aayamza Breeze in the Mitch Millard Memorial race over 750m. It was a great race and at the first bend both our runners were 5th and 6th but a powerful burst of middle pace saw Baroness Bullet go through the field and hit the front coming off the last bend to scorch away to win by 3 1/2 lengths from the running on Aayamza Breeze, who ran a cracker in defeat, in a fine 47.60 It’s fantastic that Romford still honour Mitch who was taken from us way too early, I will always have some great and fond memories of a man who loved everything about Greyhound racing.

 

On Sunday at Henlow I must admit my expectations of a victory for Not So Classical were not very high as he had his first race back since breaking a hock some five months ago. Going into an open over 550m off the back of some reasonable trials he blasted out to lead a decent class race and holding on gamely he won well in 33.50, an excellent victory in the circumstances and all connections were delighted. After a torrid summer where we had a number of high class casualties Not So Classical is hopefully the first of many to come back and race successfully, it’s all about miles on the track rather than age and he has the potential to still be a force on the open race scene, well done to all our team for their efforts in this excellent comeback.

 

Off the track it was another boost to the industry to see the launch of the Recovery Scheme by the GBGB. Basically when ever a Greyhound is unfortunate enough to get a serious injury, and it is a rare occurrence, the scheme will allow up to £400 of after treatment to repair and operate on a Greyhound if for any reason a trainer or owner has difficulty in finding the money to fix an injured dog. This alone will make the euthanasia on ‘economic grounds’ on the green forms a thing of the past. We have and never will have used this ‘easy’ option in getting a Greyhound fixed up and now no other trainer or owner should as well. Fair play to the GBGB and let's hope the bookmakers who finance the sport show what giant strides the industry is making and put their hand in their pocket to give the sport some much needed extra funding. With the recent Apprentice scheme and a new Ambassador project surely its time to approach Sky to have a look at what the industry is doing to fix welfare issues and try to persuade them to get our main platform for showing the top class racing back and then we might see a rejuvenated open race scene which is sadly lacking at the moment. John Gilburn, who sadly passed away recently, was instrumental in helping these new projects and it's right all stakeholders get behind our governing body to implement any other project that can help achieve this.

 

 

A quiet week with just open race action from Romford (Friday) and Henlow (Sunday) where the heats of the Bedfordshire Oaks is the feature.

Our girls at Hove on Thursday in the Brighton Belle ran well but failed to make the final. A quiet week ahead but a spot of value might be had in an Owners Bonus Final at Henlow on Thursday where veteran Calco Swift could go off a decent price, she can do it from both ends and a race with 6 railers might give her a decent each way shout.

 

CALCO SWIFT - 2 pts each way - Henlow - Thursday

 

 

CHUBBYS CAVIAR - 1 pt ew ante post 33/1 - Brighton Belle- Hove - Thursday - lost

CHUBBYS TURKANA - 1 pt ew ante post 33/1 - Brighton Belle - Hove - Thursday - lost