STAR Tasmanian greyhound Damek is due to make his interstate debut in Victoria tomorrow night but a hiccup with air transport arrangements has cast some doubt over him taking his place in the grade five series at Sandown Park.
Damek was supposed to make the trip to Melbourne on Tuesday but the plane was cancelled and a further delay was caused when connections were notified that the subsequent flight on which he was booked today would have left the dog in a holding area for up to four hours.
The dog’s part-owner June Philips said the only sensible option left was to travel the dog on the day of the race.
“In the end we decided to send the dog over with his handler Ian Thomas on the day of the race because that should alleviate any chance of the d0og being put in a holding area for any great length of time,” Mrs Phillips said.
“But if the dog doesn’t have everything go his way on the trip he won’t start.”
“But I saying that we are quite confident everything will go ahead as planned and we are just hoping for a good result in his race,” she said.
Damek is unbeaten from seven starts in Tasmania with his last two efforts in Launceston record-breaking efforts.
He broke Big Moose’s track record when he won his heat if the Illingworth Classic, clocking 29.45 for the 515-metre trip, which carved 0.05 off Big Moose’s previous record that he set in March 2008.
Damek followed up in the Illingworth final with a scintillating run of 29.40 to better his own record.
He has drawn box two in tomorrow night’s heat at Sandown with a relatively slow beginner on his outside (box 3) but a speedster on his inside (1).