SO at least we have certainty now.
The English Greyhound Derby, the pinnacle of the sport, will be staged for the next five years at the Betway Towcester Racecourse.
There had been some to-ing and fro-ing it seems between the GBGB and the Towcester management but the deal was signed and Betway, with naming rights at the Northamptonshire venue, announced the news and seemed genuinely excited by it which is great.
National Hunt racing is also set to return to the famous site, home of AP McCoy’s 4,000th winner, and we are set to have another dual purpose venue on our hands.
Dunstall Park led the way in the UK – Dundalk in Ireland has for many years staged both horse and greyhound meetings – and now Towcester will follow. Will there be others?
Chelmsford has had a chequered time of it of late but a greyhound track was always mooted there, although that seems unlikely in the immediate future.
Kempton always looked a viable site a few years back given its proximity to Wimbledon and within a real greyhound stronghold in the south west of London but its own future seems in doubt. Lingfield, however, is interesting.
Floodlights are going in there so evening meetings during the winter are on the cards – and that raises the possibility of greyhound meetings.
There is understood to be restrictions on the number of nights they can race which might make regular greyhound meetings an issue, but things might change once the floodlights are operational as such.
And how well they have worked at Dunstall Park.
Anyone who has tuned into the new weekly greyhound show on Sky Sports Racing – The Box Seat – could not fail to be impressed by the viewing and clarity of what is in front of them.
I fully get racegoers are faced with a distant view of proceedings in the winter but that is where TV screens – and big screens, for that matter – come into their own.
Of course it’s a different experience, and the polar opposite, from hanging over the rail at Nottingham, Romford or Newcastle, say.
And hats off to Dunstall for how they have embraced all the major competitions – including the Classics.
The Premier Greyhound Racing Oaks and the Arena Racing Company Scurry Gold Cup were the most recent major competitions staged there – the bitches’ Classic and the traditional sprinters’ Classic, the latter upgraded this year to Category One status. Both were tremendous.
Now it’s not their fault the PGR Kent Derby clashed with the Oaks which wasn’t ideal – throw in the Bet-Goodwin Steel City Cup for a mad few weeks, as well.
And hopefully something like that can be avoided in the future. Having said that, you don’t get too many as good as Scooby The Lady come along at the same time – a bitch good enough to go for both. But even so.
She was a touch unlucky not to win the Kent Derby in the end, as was Proper Heiress. Both star trackers produced great starts in the final only for Heiress to come off the fence just as Scooby The Lady was swinging round in front.
Either could have gone on for a famous victory, but a clash at the bend denied them both.
And, of course, that has since signalled the end of Proper Heiress’s career, who now earns a deserved retirement and, hopefully, a tremendous career at stud.
What can you say about the most dominant of trackers there has been over four bends in recent years?
Just as kennelmate Mongys Wild mopped up the six- and eight-bend scene, Proper Heiress cut a swathe through the four-bend competitions.
His six Category One titles were unreal but topping that was his defeat of Bockos Diamond and Droopys Plunge in the Time Juvenile Championship, an extraordinary pre-Derby showpiece in which he bettered the reigning Irish Derby champion and the future English Derby hero.
That was awesome and, while he could not follow up in the home Derby itself, a rare Mark Wallis-trained Irish Derby entry had to be followed.
That was another story in itself and final night remains a personal favourite, especially given Cheap Sandwiches was another superstar of the track triumphant that night. That softened any disappointment.
But back to the Kent Derby and Annadown Warrior’s success – or more pertinently that of trainer Maxine Locke.
Whether that win seals her the Trainer of the Year title only time will tell. However, it certainly helped put distance between herself, Paul Young and Mark Wallis.
And in this year, of all years for the now Central Park handler, that would be a special, special win. If you know, you know.
