TOP greyhound trainer Debbie Cannan faced a dilemma recently when she had to farm out a well-bred dog to another trainer owing to a shortage of kennel space.
It was a dog she owns herself, Top Choice, that was given to Bagdad-based trainer Barry Smith to prepare.
Needless to say the well-bred pup produced a brilliant debut performance to win the Western Bulldogs Football Club Juvenile over 461 metres at Tattersall’s Park in Hobart last night.
There was very little money to suggest he could win because his price kept drifting out and ended up paying $25 on the Tote.
He began well from box four and after a short-lived battle for the lead he skipped clear and went on to win by almost two lengths from Winklee Weeper with Wanna West a close-up third and well clear of Tour De Lance.
Top Choice (Big Daddy Cool-Speedy Stitch) stoped the clock at 26.79 with splits of 5.21 and 11.56 and while not the best times recorded by a juvenile it was more than respectable compared to the 26.96 recorded by the other juvenile winner, Howard’s Puzzle, on the 10-event card.
If there was a hard-luck story fro the race it belonged to the well-backed Decembrist that began only fairly from the box eight and got crunched by the eventual winner at the top turn.
Decembrist (Big Daddy Cool-World’s Finest) was bred by Peter Phillips who also trains the dog.