Fencer nails it to boost Cup chances
STAR Tasmanian greyhound Nail’em Fencer has returned from injury better than ever with wins at his first two runs back from a break enough to have the tongues wagging about the dog’s chances of winning the Group 2 Launceston Cup in a fortnight.
Nail’em Fencer strung together nine wins from 10 starts leading up to the Group 3 Devonport Chase and was being hailed the next best thing in greyhound racing, but a leg injury suffered in the Chase final left his trainer Neville Allison with insufficient time to have him right for the Group 1 Hobart Thousand series.
The dog was eliminated from the Thousand series when unplaced in a heat, after which he was given a decent spell.
“We thought we had him right for the Hobart Thousand heat, but we just ran out of time,” Allison said.
“I gave him a month off and that was more than enough to let the injury repair and he was very keen when I gave him a couple of hand slips leading up to his first run back in Hobart.”
Nail’em Fencer resumed in an invitation grade event over 461 metres at Elwick last Thursday and won by leading throughout.
“I thought he might knock up in the straight first-up, but he surprised me the way he stuck on.”
Last Monday night in a mixed race for grades 1-2 sprinters over 515m, he flew the lids from box seven and landed two lengths clear at the judge the first time, then increased that to seven lengths down the back stretch. He defeated Hobart Thousand winner Fernando Mick by almost three lengths and stopped the clock at 29.69 which was a personal best time.
“I am confident there is improvement in the dog from that run on Monday night, so I am happy heading into the Launceston Cup heats next week. That run on Monday in Launceston was his first hitout over 500m this prep, so he’s done a great job to win like he did.” Allison has been training for many decades but has never won a Launceston Cup, so he is hoping Nail’em Fencer can allow him to put a tick on that bucket list. The heats will be run at the Mowbray Racing Centre on Monday night with the final to be held at the same venue the following Saturday night.
Harness racing on turf
HARNESS racing returns to Elwick on Sunday with the feature race, the New Norfolk Cup, to be run on the turf track.
A harness race hasn’t been staged on the turf track since a dual-code meeting was held at the venue in February 1997.
Entire meetings were held on the old inside grass track during the late 1970s when the old Royal Showground venue was undergoing a major upgrade in readiness to host the 1981 Inter Dominion. Sunday’s night meeting will begin at 5.35pm with the New Norfolk Cup (race four) scheduled to start at 7.12pm with the remaining eight races to be run on the proper harness track.
The New Norfolk Cup boasts a full field of 14 with one of last season’s betterperformed three-year-olds Miss Papenhuyzen to start from the pole position while the Todd Rattray-trained Kadar will start off the back mark of 40 metres.