All-final night at Tralee’s Christmas spectacular

GREYHOUND RACING: The cost of the January and December snow blizzards to the general greyhound has been enormous and there is no let-up with many tracks losing out this week as the snows returned with a vengeance. Tonight’s meetings at Galway, Mullingar and Drumbo Park have been called off.

Let’s hope that the last big night of the year gets the go-ahead at Tralee tonight. The Greyhound & Petworld Kingdom Derby carries a prize of €10,000 and the final is the headliner on a very attractive twelve race card which is comprised entirely of sweepstake finals. The Kingdom Derby final promises to be a real cracker with Calling Spice and Bling Bling Buzz the big two in the competition up to last weekend when Willie Barry’s Movealong Tony burst on the scene with a scorching 28.54 run.

Graham Holland’s Calling Spice has produced some sparkling performances and her early pace has been just too much for her rivals. Can she repeat it in the final? Paddy The Pricer, General Dogsbody and Ballymac Linda complete the field and they all have the ability to be very much involved in the battle.

There are few more generous supporters of greyhound sport than the Greyhound & Petworld store and this is a particularly significant week for the Abbeyfeale team of Dom Magnone and Kathleen Murphy. They are the sponsors of the Kingdom Derby final tomorrow night and have been regular supporters of track and coursing all over the country.

But this week it has also been confirmed that they are to be the new sponsors of the Coursing Oaks at Powerstown next February. They take over from the Hotel Minella which has sponsored the feature events at the National Meeting over many years.

On the subject of Tralee, racing will resume on Friday, January 7 with the first qualifying trials on Monday, January 10th. The management received an early Christmas bonus with the news that the Kingdom Supporters Club will subsidise racing on Tuesday nights for January and February as well as sponsoring two major sweepstakes. The first of these will be a €4,000 to the winner Mini Open for 48 dogs commencing on Tuesday, January 11th.

While Tralee received good news on the sponsorship front, Limerick also had confirmation of the continued sponsorship by Vetsearch of the Kennedy Cup which is the first feature event of the year at the track. The competition will be for 48 dogs and will have a total prizefund of €7,800 with the winner receiving €3,500 and trophy. The first round will be on Saturday, January 22nd with the final on Saturday, February 12th.

Curraheen Park is one of the tracks racing between Christmas and the New Year and the next meeting will be on Thursday next, December 30th. Then they will race again on the following Thursday, January 6th. The Racing Office will close this evening at 5 pm and will re-open for one day on Thursday next. It will then close again until re-opening on Tuesday, January 4th. Entries will close on Tuesday, January 4th for the 24 dog €1,200 Fermoy & Print & Design A3 (Bg) 525 and then on Thursday, January 6th for the 12 dog €600 A5 (Bg) 525.

The racing schedule in Dublin is completed for the year with last night’s meeting at Shelbourne scrapped. The next meeting in Dublin will be at Harold’s Cross on Tuesday, January 4th and the opening meeting at Shelbourne two nights later. The postponed finals of the Ted Hegarty Marathon and the Tote Gold Collar will be run at Harold’s Cross on Friday, January 7th.

Over the years we have visited Youghal Track on many occasions and each and every time enjoyed the Craic with Jimmy Coleman who has operated the bar at the track for 46 years.

Well, Jimmy is stepping aside after next Monday’s meeting. The friendly face and banter will be missed by all the regulars and I am sure a few glasses will be raised to him on Monday.

We’ll end on a sad note, with the death of Des Hanrahan. The genial Limerickman was a great character and served the greyhound industry extremely well in his role as Chairman of Bord na gCon. It was a very different industry in those days but Des was head of the body which decided to buy some of our leading tracks and take them under the umbrella of the Board when they could have been lost to the sport. He will be sadly missed by his huge range of friends all over the world.