All the latest from Crayford Greyhound Track
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The Ladbrokes Golden Jacket gets
under way with the six first round heats on Saturday
night.
Thirty-six of the best stayers
from around the country will go to traps all hoping to land the
£15,000 winner’s prize. Unusually, there are no Irish raiders this
year.
Last Saturday night saw five
trial stakes races for the event which gave trainers the chance to
give their dogs both a chance to run the track and hopefully do a
time that would gain entry into the heats this weekend.
The racing manager will be
looking to field the strongest 36 greyhounds available so here is
my review of the performances from the weekend.
I did a check during the week on
the winning times in Jacket finals over the last 21 years. The
fastest win time was recorded by Blues Best Taylor in 2001 when the
dog recorded a 45.19 seconds for the 714 metres. So that is the
benchmark.
I have to start, therefore, with
the outstanding time of 45.31 seconds registered by Farley Zach in
his trial stakes win on Saturday. Trained by Kim Billingham, at
Monmore, he has the experience needed having had 48 career races
around no fewer than 11 different tracks. Such knowledge will hold
him in good stead.
The only other winner’s time
under 46.00 seconds from the remaining four trials races was set by
Creamery Quest who managed a 45.79.
This is the fastest time that
the dog has recorded at Crayford and would indicate that he will
have to find further improvement to reach the last six.
As at the time of writing, the
trap draw has not yet been made for this weekend’s heats so it is
difficult to try and work out which dogs will go through to the
semis stage. However, having looked at the potential starters, I
would like to give an early vote of confidence to Express Trend,
Blue Bee, Bush Whitney and Farley Zach.
Trend is trained by Liz McNair
and comes into the event having won her last three Open
races.
Blue Bee I would give an outside
chance to and trainer Matt Dartnell will be looking for her to
improve round to round. She could be a decent price and would be a
good value bet.
Bush Whitney has connections to
last year’s winner Bush Paddy in the shape of part owner Wally
Downes, who is a coach at West Ham United.
Thursday, February 02 2012
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