JOHN MARRIOTT
As the new chairman of the BGBF, I am pleased to have this opportunity on the Greyhound Star website to pass on and update information to fellow greyhound breeders.
As secretary to the then chairman Stuart Forsdike, we worked well as a team, introducing a variety of new competitions at various venues around the country. We saw this as vital to encourage British breeding.
Just to make it crystal clear, once we had introduced a competition, we were determined to have continuity year on year. Last year we were extremely grateful to Servoca Nursing for their sponsorship of the final event of the year,the Towcester British bred Derby.
Funds were limited, without their generous sponsorship, but the competition was always going to take place. Breeders can also rest assured that all of our events will take place again this year
So, how does the BGBF work ?
Well, each year we apply to the fund for funding of our races. We applied for just over £99,000 in order to fully commit to our calendar of events this year. Unfortunately, the ‘racing fund committee’ only allocated us £65,000, leaving us with a £34,000 shortfall.
This makes it extremely difficult and we need to find sponsors to help us out. It is also a strange situation where we can not find ‘part sponsors’. I do not know the reason why but a sponsor has to provide all of the money for the final or we can not accept their sponsorship. It seems crazy in the current climate where sponsors are difficult to find. perhaps this needs changing.
On the plus side, the Stud Book tells us that British breeding numbers are up , albeit slightly. King Elvis was voted Greyhound of the year, and on a personal level, I am getting a lot more enquiries about breeding British. Indeed, plenty of top trainers are now looking for quality British bred greyhounds rather than just looking in Ireland.
To finish, I will say that hopefully it won’t be long before the first sponsor is ‘over the line’ and we can finalise our calendar of events completely.
