We can’t let the hare sit on seeding issue

Following on from last week’s article regarding seeding, prominent breeder and former Limerick and Clare GOBA chairman Eamonn Cronin was in contact to add a couple of points he felt were relevant.

Cronin, who has a wealth of experience in the industry spanning some 40 years, and has become synonymous with the successful Soviet prefix, is of the same opinion as I, that there is a bias against wide seeds and that something needs to be done.

While there are a number of contributory factors, he firmly believes the speed of the hare coming to the traps is one such issue. Out of context it might be difficult to understand, but part of the problem, as he explains it, is to do with the automation of the system.

Currently, the hare is timed so that the boxes open a set period of time after the lure is set in motion, the hare hitting a number of switches along the way to notify the system that it is still in motion.

And when that time elapses – theoretically, when the boxes open – the hare driver gains control of the hare for the first time.

In a letter sent to the IGB in 2010, hoping that the issue would be addressed for the new Limerick track, Cronin wrote: “It was always known that if a slow hare was given in a race in the old trapping system that the outside dog would not break ... This is where the automated system came into play.”

Expanding on that belief, yesterday, he added: “When it wasn’t an automated trapping system like we have now, we hadn’t the problem ... I’ll never forget the night Toms The Best drew trap six in the final of the Derby in Shelbourne Park – what a roar went up! And it was the same in Limerick, if you were drawn trap six you had a right chance.

“If you’re drawn in trap six in Limerick now ... you’re at about a four or five-length disadvantage - the reason being that the hare is coming too slow to the traps. You can’t speed it up and have it flying – there’s a happy medium. I would say the hare is level with the traps when they open, whereas it should be in front of them.

“If you have a very windy or rainy night, I think it would affect the trapping more so. It doesn’t make any sense to me how it is currently done.

“No way would I seed a dog wide in Limerick, Cork or Tralee. I don’t think I’d do it in Shelbourne Park either. There’s something wrong somewhere along the line and it’s been that way since they brought in the timing system.”

Cronin was also keen to point out that he believes the hare rail being too far out also affects the way the dogs run the bends.

“What caused the trouble in the two semi-finals [of the Con & Annie Kirby Memorial at Limerick]? The hare rail is too far out.

“If you brought the hare rail in, firstly it would make it an awful lot easier for the hare driver to drive the hare, and, secondly, the dog would run the bend an awful lot better.

“Recently we had an incident of a dog breaking its leg at the bend. People may say it happens, and it’s greyhound racing, but maybe it shouldn’t happen. Maybe something needs to be addressed there.

“Also, I don’t agree with the colour of the lure they have at the moment. At a lot of the tracks, the colour of the hare is nearly black and if I can’t sight it when I’m looking for it, how can the dogs sight it?

“It was voted in by the Greyhound Owners and Breeders’ Association in Limerick to bring in the orange hare, but the powers that be, in the regulations department, changed it back without consultation [with the GOBA].”

Cronin’s fear is that people have been lost to the game through frustration with a number of issues which have not been resolved, and more will go the same way if we’re not more proactive in improving the fundamentals. Difficult to argue with that.