Monday, August 13, 2018
Portland greyhound trainer Brian Weis well remembers the night a couple of months ago and a close- to-midnight knock on the door. Turns out it was a greyhound transport driver to inform Weis that he had a greyhound on board for him.
“To be honest, I wasn’t expecting any new greyhounds and had no idea as to what the dog was or, in fact, who owned the bloody thing,” Weis said.
“As it was, it was about another three days before I received a phone call from one of the owners. ‘Yes, sorry about that,’ he said. ‘I meant to ring you a few days ago’.”
Turns out the dog was Theo’s Thunder, a son of Dyna Double One and Victorian city winner Miss Suzie Que, that had raced on Victorian tracks on eight occasions for seven minor placings.
The black dog’s first two starts at Tara Raceway resulted in a second and a win over 512 metres in a steady 30.98 seconds but after he followed up soon after with a best of day 29.85 seconds win Weis was starting to wish that he received more late night calls.
Theo’s Thunder, after three runs at Horsham, was back at Tara Raceway for Sunday’s meeting, drawing box six in a pretty handy South Eastern Hotel Stake (512 m) for grade five greyhounds.
He settled in third spot early and ultimately did a good job to defeat hot favourite Bereluke who attempted to lead all the way before going down by three-quarters of a length to Theo’s Thunder in a time of 30.37 seconds.
The win was the first leg of a double for Weis, Hill Top Hood later staging a big performance to win the Metal Worx Stake (512 m).
A maiden winner last month at Tara Raceway, the brindle dog was slowly away from box one and set himself a fair task before finishing strongly to defeat Cee Me Turbo – a nice trial for the forthcoming Peter Rocket Winter Classic – by a head in 30.46 seconds.
For Weis, it was the second time in the space of a month that the pair had won on the same day at Tara Raceway and his third double for the year after Xtreme Caution and Xtreme Purpose – a good third on Sunday in the Trackside Meats Stake (512 m) behind Chilly Kiss and Ben Nevis – were successful early in the year.
Meanwhile, locally-based Noel Perry, only training greyhounds since last month, continued on his winning way on Sunday when George Regis led all the way to defeat Big Lebowski by 1¾ lengths in a best of day 23.16 seconds.
The win in the winningformula.net.au Stake (400 m), the second heat of a grade five series, completed a good few days for Perry, who has now trained five winners, after Mount Ghost was successful in the Greg Martlew Autos Stake (400 m) on Friday.