Mildenhall, or Suffolk Downs as it’s now known in the greyhound world, will always represent an important piece of my life. First through stock car racing, and latterly through our beloved greyhound racing.
It’s unsurprising then, that when the announcement came back in mid 2023 that open racing was to be staged on Thursday nights, I become that 17 year old fan boy again! My concern was that they were going to be filled with graded dogs that couldn’t make up a usual same-grade race, and just be fobbed off as ‘opens’. Not a bit of it.
So far the track has had category 1 finalists and runner ups, exciting flying pups, 29.00 second Towcester winners, 23 second Crayford barrier breakers, and it’s showing no signs of stopping just yet!
The loyal and regular based crowd turn up every week and really give a ‘greyhound people’ atmosphere. Everybody has become accustomed to knowing the dogs and all different types of betting opinions are flying around. It’s old school, and I love it!
With the first category 2 due to be held there next month, I had chance to catch up with racing manager Robbie Steward, who had this to say.
“They’ve (the open race support) been really good to be fair. Our own trainers gave them a kickstart, the likes of Jim Daly, Jason Ray and Michelle Brown, and now it’s strongly supported by away trainers.”
“Michelle gives me a hand and lets me use her top end dogs if I need to fill a race, but they still stand a good chance in there, they’re dogs that belong in them races.”
On whether open racing is planning to stick around at the West Row venue, Robbie had this to say.
“As far as I know they’re going to carry on going. We’d love to go back to 5 meetings again. Those open races on a Thursday night, greyhound tv (formerly racing post tv) love it, we love it, and they’ll carry on.”
April see’s category 2 action take place and its something that looks like it’s going to be strongly supported.
“We’ve got a couple of £750 races coming up in the next couple of weeks, (Suffolk Midi Trophy 548m Flat £500, Suffolk Maiden Dash Trophy 220m Flat £750, Suffolk Maiden Midi Trophy 548m Flat £750.) just to try and entice people to come and that seems to have worked with the likes of Nathan Hunt now coming. We’ve also got an invitation race on tomorrow night that we’ve put £500 up for. That was supposed to be a 548m competition, but when you’ve got dogs of that calibre, I didn’t want to say ‘sorry we didn’t fill it’. So we’ve stuck that up and decided to make it a one off race.
Every track seems to be struggling for dogs on the graded strength, and sadly it’s not much different here. The loss of Jim Daly to Nottingham, undoubtedly playing a big part.
“It’s okay (the graded strength) for the 3 meetings. Obviously losing Jim was a bit of a blow but these things happen and it’s still sitting there nicely at 3 graded meetings. If I could find the extra 60-70 dogs, then I’d have the extra 4th graded meeting. We currently run Monday, Tuesday, opens on a Thursday and Friday.”
Trainers are reminded that entries for the open races shut at Monday Noon.
If you haven’t been yet, I urge you to give it a go. It’s not Romford, it’s not Hove, it’s not Towcester. But what it is, is a stripped back dog track, with proper dog people, and that’ll do for me.
Until next time.
Liam
