CHASING A DROUGHT BREAKER
IT’S been more than 20 years since Lara greyhound trainer Rob Britton claimed a Geelong Cup. He takes Blue Gum Hill and Not Availablee to the boxes for tonight’sto Group 2 final..
A FAMILY touched by road trauma will have something to cheer about when their greyhound Corleone King runs as one of the rank outsiders in tonight’s Geelong Gold Cup.
Owner breeder Gary Kimber was involved in a head-on car crash on Mother’s Day last year, not far from his farm in Young, NSW.
Paramedics resuscitated him at the scene before he was flown almost 400km to a Sydney hospital, where he spent eight months overcoming a severe brain injury and multiple broken bones.
All the while, the family had a handful of greyhounds broken in but unraced.
“One day they got them back in work and one of them was showing a lot of ability so they rang me to try him out,” Lara trainer David Geall said.
The dog turned out to be Corleone King.
“He was already over 2½ years of age and he hadn’t raced,” Geall said.
“That’s very unusual in greyhound racing to not have a start before they’re 2½.”
It took three runs for Corleone King to break his maiden, over 450m at Warrnambool on January 7. By July 20, he’d had 27 starts for six wins after back-to-back victories at Geelong over the 460m.
It was then that Geall had one race in mind.
“He likes Geelong more than any track,” he said.
“He’s run some fast times there and beaten some good dogs before, and he does it from the inside, which he’s got (tonight).”
While rated a $13 chance with Sportsbet, Geall said Corleone Kid, who now boasts 10 victories and more than $20,000 in career earnings, was not without a hope.
“I’m only 10 minutes from the track and all our better, faster dogs over the years have been 500m dogs, so we haven’t had a lot to put in the Geelong Cup,” he said.
“He just has to jump with the field, that’s the only hope. If he jumps with the field, he does really go.
“He’s a bit of an underrated dog.”
And win or lose, there will be a proud family cheering on from the local RSL in Young.
“The owners are very excited, they just can’t wait,” Geall said.
“They’ve finally bred a dog that’s in a Group race, because that’s a big thing as a breeder.”