Kevin Hutton is to leave Monmore at the end of the month and re-join Towcester, the track where he enjoyed his greatest success as a Derby winning trainer in the 2018 Star Sports Greyhound Derby.
Kevin will be explaining the background to his decision in a Zoom call with the Star later this evening. (The other guest is Rab McNair!!).
Meanwhile Graham Rankin is to leave Pelaw Grange and take Hutton’s place at Monmore.
It will be a 476 mile round trip from his kennels in Airdrie, but the traveling offers no fears for the man currently in sixth place in the Trainers Championship.
He said: “I allow four hours for the drive each way, and it will be either myself or Stuart doing the driving. But that has never bothered me. When I was playing golf I would drive to all parts of England and then play a round. It is no problem. It is all motorway barring the last 10 minutes so it isn’t a bad journey.
“I had a good chat with Tony Williamson (Monmore RM) who I got on really well with when I took Macie down for the Puppy Derby and I think he is planning on me running two meetings a week at present. I am starting off with ten dogs with another coming this week and I have just bought three more decent dogs. I don’t intend to have any more than 17-18 which is as many as I can practically manage.
“I would like to thank Pelaw Grange for welcoming me there and they have said that I can go back if everything doesn’t work out. But it was so difficult to make it pay running there with £10 for a runner and £50 for a winner. I’ll get more than that for finishing last at Monmore. In fact, if I hadn’t been given this chance I doubt I would have stayed in the game beyond the next six months.”
In the meantime, Graham has plenty on his plate with the impending RPGTV Juvenile which is due to take place at Towcester next Tuesday where Jaguar Macie has drawn trap two. She clocked a slightly disappointing 30.09 (-20) over the 500m course on Sunday.
Graham said: “She absolutely walked away from the boxes and that would be my biggest concern for Tuesday. Ideally she could have done with another trial. The Towcester traps are a bit weird; I think all the tracks should have similar traps to be honest.
“But it is what it is. If we get beat on Tuesday there will be no complaints from me. Macie has already done me proud. She had done nothing since winning at Newcastle, but I have now put some work into her.”
