Monday, April 29, 2019

Weekly Thursday greyhound racing, to be run in conjunction with the regular Sunday meetings, will commence at Tara Raceway this week and replace the previous fortnightly Wednesday fixtures.

To be known as G-SIX racing, both weekly meetings at Tara Raceway will comprise six-dog fields (compared to the traditional eight). This will also be the case at Angle Park and Gawler for what will be a three-month trial period.

The G-SIX form of racing is similar to that at English and Irish tracks – Scottish track Shawfield actually runs with five dogs – but has the advantage of dogs being slightly more spread out at box-rise.

Besides cleaner racing with less interference, the G-SIX format is expected to drive up participant returns by the equivalent of more than $1m annually.

Boxes 3 and 6 will be vacant for the six-dog racing with all runners carrying the rug colour that correlates to their box draw – red, black/white stripes, blue, yellow, black and pink. Any reserve runners gaining a start will carry the standard rug colours for 9 and 10.

While eight-dogs has been the norm for many years in Australia, in the early days of mechanical hare racing there were a few variations tried, ranging from six to 10-dog races.

The Mount Gambier Greyhound Racing Club’s Thursday fixtures at Tara Raceway will be time-graded meetings for lower-grade dogs while Sundays will remain as Category 3 with unplaced runners receiving $50.

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