Bessy Boo will achieve yet another milestone when next he steps out for a race at Wentworth Park as the event will mark this wonderful greyhound's 100th appearance at headquarters.
When Bessy Boo won last Wednesday night he took his Wentworth Park 520m tally to 28 wins from 91 starts.
And early in his career Bessy Boo proved his versatility by winning three of eight 720m Wentworth Park races.
Not only has no greyhound ever won as many Wentworth Park races but there has never been another to have made so many appearances on the track.
"I will be nominating him for Wentworth Park on Wednesday but didn't realise it would be his 100th appearance there," his trainer Christine Proctor said.
"He is truly a greyhound in two million because he has never had a spell and since he began racing he has had only two trials, at Cannington in preparation for the National Championship and at Dapto to familiarise him with that track before the Megastar.
"Bessy Boo pulled up beautifully after his win last Wednesday, and by Thursday morning I was hard pressed holding him, he was anxious to go out and race again!''
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Greg Board, who bred, owned and was the original trainer of 2011 Vic Peters Classic winner Spring Gun, Spring Secret, who won 15 races and $91,000 along with Spring Gladiator, is back training winners after being sidelined for almost three years due to serious illness.
Spring Gladiator won 12 of his first 14 starts, including the ORANGE and Bathurst Cups for Board, while Spring Gun and Spring Secret began their careers in his kennels at ORANGE before being transferred to top Sydney trainer Christine Oldfield.
Board won with Spring Bloom, a daughter of Spring Gun, at Richmond last Wednesday and expects to win with her and her litter brother Spring Clarkie when he brings them to Wentworth Park.
"In November, 2013, I was diagnosed with throat cancer and spent two months living near Sydney's St Vincent's Hospital while I underwent daily radiation and chemotherapy treatment,'' Board said.
"Thank to a wonderful doctor I am fine now so have returned to breeding, owning and training greyhounds.
"Andrea Dailly was training Spring Clarkie and Spring Bloom for me while I was ill and Spring Clarkie won at The Meadows.
"Since they have been back at my place Spring Clarkie has not raced but Spring Bloom won a clearance trial over 450m at Bathurst in 25.55sec and has since won two from three starts, at Cowra and Richmond.
"While she did not run fast time in her win last Wednesday she usually improves sharply with a run on a track and she had not trialled or raced at Richmond before last week.''
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It was interesting to see Big Red Sun win a 400m Richmond Maiden Final for trainer Adam Wade last Wednesday.
The almost identically named Big Redsun was a top grade sprinter at Wentworth and Harold Parks in the late 1960s, and was a kennelmate of the legendary Zoom Top, both being trained by the late Hec Watt.
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The great Paua To Burn has passed away, just a month short of her 14th birthday.
Paua To Burn, a Greyhound Hall Of Fame inductee, set five track records and won 28 races for Kerri and Steve White including the 2005 Golden Easter Egg, the 2005 The Temlee, the 2004 Laurels Classic and the Sapphire Crown in 2004 and 2005.
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Kieth Anderson, whose dog Sudoku Bullet is among the top contenders for tonight's Taylor Family Clarence Valley Sheds Maiden heats at Grafton, is not well known in Sydney but has had a long career in the sport.
"I've been exercising greyhounds since I was eight and in 1997 took my stepfather Jim Robinson's dog Prince Of Tigers to Adelaide where he won the Group One National Sprint Championship at Angle Park,'' the 47-year-old Northern Rivers trainer said.
