Stephen Kutnjak is a patient man. Persistent too. And after the first race on Sunday at Muswellbrook, he also became a very happy man.
Stephen has just one greyhound in his kennel, a girl called Bula Betty who is just two months shy of her fifth birthday.
On Sunday at The Brook, Bula Betty took out the first event, scoring by a narrow, but decisive margin. That was her maiden success and followed 72 previous attempts to win a race.
More than two years and three months after her first start, Bula Betty was finally a winner.
“I was just ecstatic,” the Minchinbury trainer explained. “I was so happy that she finally got there.
“I called the family and they were all excited too.
“She’s the only dog I have. I only raced her once a week and she had her chances earlier in her career. Early on she had chances to win races, but dogs are dogs, and they can find a way to lose.
“A couple of weeks ago I thought she was going to win at MUDGEE (she was beaten by half a length), but yesterday she knew how to catch the other one and got there for the win.”
Despite the advice of many to move Bula Betty on, Stephen refused.
“She’s coming on five now, and my grandkids are five and half, so they have kind of grown up together,” he explained.
“And what happened too was that I had five (heart) bypasses, and me and Betty have probably been looking after each other pretty well.”
After dabbling in greyhound ownership, back in 2004 Stephen decided to expand into breeding and training. And from that came a dog called Dirt Trap.
“Dirt Trap was my claim to fame before this one came along,” Stephen said. “She had 69 starts before she broke her maiden back in 2006. She then won two in a row at Richmond and then three out of four when she won at Wentworth Park.”
They were the only three races she would win from 170 starts but as Stephen says, she just loved to go to the races.
“And it’s the same for me and Bula Betty,” he said. “We’re doing this because we love it. It’s fun. We had a great day at Muswellbrook and I must thank everyone at the club, they were fantastic.
“I’ve always said that there’s a race for every dog. On Sunday, Bula Betty found her race.”
