He had one winner from eleven runners on Saturday but by Kevin Boothby’s standards, he was on a roll writes Floyd Amphlett.
The Henlow promoter is by far the biggest owner at his own track, not that it carries any weight with the racing manager.
“Let’s just say you wouldn’t want his strike rate” says Paul Mellor as he contemplates stitching his boss up for another two meetings. He adds: “In all seriousness, I don’t know what we would do without his runners. He probably has 30 racing dogs in seven different kennels including a couple of cases where the trainer was thinking about giving up.
“Some of his dogs are in his own name, others are in partnership with people who he has brought into ownership. Savana Hugo, for example, is owned by Kevin and former West Ham player Jack Collison.
“He has never moaned once when his dogs are beaten. Needless to say, there are some who are the opposite. A couple of Saturday’s ago one of the other trainers was whingeing because Kevin had four winners – but it was an exceptional night for him, and he did have 14 runners.
“Without Kevin’s dogs, there would have been times when we couldn’t have put on a meeting, and if a small track like this loses a meeting, it would be hard to justify staying open.”
Not content merely to own them, ‘Big Kev’ is also a successful breeder with one litter in particular more than holding their own.
Whelped in June 12, the monster litter of 13 pups by Ten Large Down out of Savana Bonny featured 11 who made it to the track. They include open race winning ‘Savanas’ Fatboy and Mark and the useful Mark who has won three of his last four graded races.
Mellor said: “The whole litter looked very average when they started out but they have done nothing but improve.”
The track have confirmed that the Westmead Hawk Memorial will be staged again in August as a graded competition.
Mellor said: “It will be £5,000 to the winner and will be for genuine local graders over three consecutive Sundays starting on the 16th. The plan is for 24-runners, but I would increase it to 36 if there was enough interest.”
Mellor was also quick to acknowledge the recent Derby win of local owner trainer Danny Riordan who plans to parade Rio Quattro at the Lower Stondon circuit.
Mellor said: “I was away on holiday and left the instruction that I wasn’t to be contacted about greyhound racing, but when Danny won the final, Dad phoned me with the news. I was thrilled. I don’t think there is a more popular man in greyhound racing than Danny. With Nick’s successes included, there can’t be a track with a better recent Derby record than Henlow.”
