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Michael Clayton has been in the sport for a long time – around three decades in fact, but while he admits it doesn’t bother him too much, he is a little miffed that his dog Hear The Drums hasn’t attracted any attention from the greyhound racing media.
And a glance at the formguide and you have to ask the question why?
Hear The Drums – naturally with a name like that, a son of Fernando Bale – has won his past seven starts. But wait, there’s more. He has won 10 of his past 11 starts. But wait again, still more.
Since October 15 last year, Hear The Drums has raced 30 times. He has racked up 19 wins and 10 placings, the only unplaced run coming at Wentworth Park back in May. In that time period he has won at: Canberra, Richmond, Goulburn, Maitland, Bulli, Wentworth Park, and Nowra.
“It’s a pretty impressive record,” Clayton said. “And the dog wins anywhere. I have taken him here, taken him there, and he just keeps winning at the moment.”
The last one in the aforementioned list of winning tracks, is where Hear The Drums will be on Monday night, chasing another win, this time in a regional heat of the GRNSW + Ladbrokes Million Dollar Chase.
“Yeah he knows Nowra, he likes the track, he’s unbeaten there over the 365m,” Clayton said. “He can run 500m the dog, but he gets a little bit tired.”
The majority of wins from Hear The Drums have been over short course, but he did win over 520m at Wentworth Park five runs back.
“He went 30.11s that night and I think he’s going better now than he was then.
“And he’s shown that too in his races. He ran 22.37s at Bulli and 20.56s around Nowra and coming away from dogs. He’s flying the lids and just running away from them.
“I’ve put him box to box there the last three weeks and he’s really going well. Because he’s not a tough 500m dog I’ve strengthened him up by giving him 450ms at the track where he is going to qualify.
“But it will be a big test for him on Monday.”
Clayton said he was always going to target Nowra as the track where he would try to qualify for the Million Dollar Chase semi-finals.
“I thought most of the interstate dogs would try and qualify at Wentworth Park,” he explained. “In my plan it would be just local dogs racing at Nowra. I couldn’t see dogs from Victoria and dogs who haven’t been to Nowra going to Nowra, because it’s a tricky track, so I decided my best avenue of qualifying for the semis would be at Nowra.
“I think this way it’s given the dog every possible chance to take that step to the semis.”
Hear The Drums is raced by a Victorian syndicate, the K9 Racers. Their association with Clayton, who trains at Sutton Forest in the NSW Southern Highlands, goes back a few years.
“I reared a couple of pups for the K9 racing syndicate in Victoria and they said if you ever find a dog to train, give us a ring and well buy it for you, and I found a dog called Slick Simzy,” Clayton recalled.
“They bought him for about $12,000 I think and he’s won $70,000 and we’ve won 23 races with him. He’s four years and nine months and still going around.
“After they bought that dog, I reared a few more for them and this dog (out of Double Twister) was one of the ones I reared for them. So he’s been here from the start.
“I didn’t break him in. They break all the dogs in down in Victoria, so they know roughly what they can do, and they can compare them with others they have broken, and know what they have got, and where they should send the dog.
“He came back here, thankfully, and I started racing him.”
Nowra hosts three heats of the Million Dollar Chase tonight, with another three heats being held at Grafton. Both venues will stage their Regional Finals next Monday, with first and second heading to Wentworth Park on October 12 for the semi-finals.
