Author: Editor BOAY

Mark and Lisa Delbridge celebrated their greatest moment in greyhound racing when powerhouse youngster Yachi Bale was a barnstorming winner of the $1 million Group 1 Sportsbet Melbourne Cup Final (515m) at Sandown Park on Saturday night. Yachi Bale, the ‘baby’ of the Melbourne Cup field, was the Delbridges’ first Cup finalist and he produced an unbelievable finishing burst to claim the $650,000 winner’s purse. Yachi Bale sprouted wings in the home straight to defeat Fernando Mick, denying David Geall a third Melbourne Cup victory in five years, and favourite…

Unrelenting NSW stayer Stagger Out Lee pulled off a ‘staggering’ last-to-first victory in the $165,500 Group 1 Sportsbet Bold Trease final (715m) at Sandown Park on Saturday night. Trained at Wagga by 24-year-old Jack Strutt – a final year law student at the University of Wollongong – Stagger Out Lee snared a $105,000 first prize in “amazing” fashion. Quite aptly, it was akin to the days of the immortal “Warrnambool Warrior” – Bold Trease – which won four successive Sandown Cups with whirlwind finishes in the late 1980s. “It’s a dream…

David Geall’s remarkable recent record in the Group 1 Sportsbet Melbourne Cup has continued with the two-time Cup-winning trainer qualifying Fernando Mick, his fourth finalist in the last six years. Lara-based Geall is taking aim at back-to-back Cup victories, after Koblenz led all-the-way in 2021, while My Redeemer reigned supreme in 2018. Like Fernando Mick, both Koblenz and My Redeemer are sons of 2015 Cup runner-up Fernando Bale, while Koblenz’s mother Up Hill Jill, was unplaced in the 2017 final. “It’s been a ride!” Geall said. “I’m sure the little…

The inaugural Sportsbet Dream Chasers Festival reaches fever pitch at Sandown Park on Saturday night with the 67th running of the $1 million Group 1 Sportsbet Melbourne Cup Final (515m). Widely regarded as the world’s greatest greyhound race, the Melbourne Cup headlines the penultimate night of the $4.1 million Dream Chasers Festival, which will conclude with the second running of The Phoenix at The Meadows on Saturday, December 17. Eight ‘must win’ Cup heats were conducted in wet conditions last Saturday, with El Dorado, trained by 75-year-old Daryl Holmes at…

GRV’s Peter Quilty, Gerard Guthrie and Trent Langskaill provide their thoughts on some of the star greyhounds racing in Victoria.   Keep an eye on these, they are worth saving in your WatchDog Blackbook!   Quilts  Gents, the world’s greatest greyhound race is almost here. Let’s go through the finalists for the $1 million Group 1 Sportsbet Melbourne Cup in box draw order. Gerard  Jason Thompson would be thrilled that Plaintiff has the inside draw. He is unbeaten in four starts from Box 1 and his last two victories have…

Mark Delbridge admits he wasn’t thinking seriously about tackling the $1 million Group 1 Sportsbet Melbourne Cup with potential staying star Yachi Bale. But a conversation with owner/breeder Brendan Wheeler, son of late, great breeding legend Paul, changed Delbridge’s mind, and the result is his first Cup finalist. “I wasn’t even going to worry about the Melbourne Cup,” Delbridge admitted. “I was going to concentrate on the Silver Chief and then the Sale Cup, because all I want to do is get Yachi Bale and his brother, Zoha Bale, over…

Meet the sport’s modern-day “Clancy of the Overflow”. A potential life as a ‘legal eagle’ may not be for 24-year-old NSW greyhound trainer, Jack Strutt. It seems he’d swap a “dingy little office” for a lead and collar any day. Strutt has just finished his sixth year of a double degree (Bachelor of Economics/Finance, and Bachelor of Laws) at the University of Wollongong. He has only one semester remaining to achieve a goal of entering commercial law. But this ‘dream chaser’ also has his heart pulsating in another arena. Quite…