Imagine that you own an apple tree. Every autumn you pick the apples, eat a few, give a few away but most just rot away.

Then the owner of a local farm shop offers you 20 pence a pound. He sells them for 30 pence a pound and you are both happy.

Lovely jubbley! Nice few bob.

The following week, he packages them in brown paper bags, advertises them on social media at £1 per pound.

Overnight – you are being screwed!

 

I first became aware of a greyhound equivalent back in the mid 1970s.

A Yarmouth permit trainer was in the downstairs office attempting to lay down the law to track owner Len Franklin.

Your prize money is shit!

I can’t remember exactly how much it was – something like £18 for a win, a £5 for second and £3 others.

But she was trying to threaten the wrong bloke. To cut a long story short, ‘Old Man’ Franklin advised her in a six word sentence, ‘**** *** to Bury St Edmunds’.

She was barred and never returned.

There is no doubt that this particular lady had scanned the thousands of holiday makers buying beers, chips and tote tickets and decided that she was being taken for a mug.

Sure enough, she ended up at Bury St Edmunds. Winners £10 including your race entry fee of £1 and you had to pay admission to get in.

The thing is – she had been happily running dogs at both tracks – despite the prize money discrepancy – for years.

I’ve seen many other examples since. Owners kicking off about prize money at Peterborough with its whizzing tunstiles and full restaurant, but okay to run for two thirds the amount at Henlow – and paying to see their dogs runs – when the track was on its arse.

I wonder whether that Yarmouth trainer would feel the same today?

What is a dog in A6 at Yarmouth worth these days? £600-£800? The older ones, quite a bit less.

Averaging it out, that moderate grader is probably running once a week, one win in every six races and picking up an average of just over £50 per race. £200 per month

If the owner has six dogs available, the trainer gets an extra £200 per month bonus payment.

Remember, this is a hobby trainer. Nobody makes them do it. If Yarmouth closed, there is no hobby.

They could take up golf or angling but the payments flow in the other direction.

It is different for professionals of course. It is a fact that there are some professional greyhound trainers at a small number of tracks who are still struggling.

Since the closure of Walthamstow, the best payers have always been Entain. But recent increases mean many many other trainers have never seen so much money. They don’t want to be quoted, but one top professional told me recently ‘I don’t want owners any more, I can afford to buy the dogs myself now.’

£50 prize money for also-rans, at some tracks, £30 trainers bonus every time they go to boxes. Plus significant monthly retainer increases. Some even get diesel allowances.

Many trainers incomes have increased by 40- 50% overnight.

Understandably, most of the beneficiaries are keeping their heads down (and moaning a bit less). Others refuse to acknowledge that anything has changed and are whining because they don’t know any different.

Are these increases long overdue? 100% Decades overdue!

Is training greyhounds overpaid for the hours that have to be put in? No!

Is greyhound training now a lucrative profession? Absolutely not. These guys earn every penny.

But things have significantly improved – there is a great deal less screwing going on . So let’s acknowledge it and have some more positivity in the industry.

As for the abuse I will get for daring for even making this point. . . . water-duck-back!

 

This week’s Editors Chair was meant to be about racing injuries. It was written last week but by unfortunate coincidence, it was overtaken by events.

John Mullins was going to be quoted about trainers incorrectly blaming track surfaces for the majority of injuries.

Then on Friday night, Smallmead broke at hock at Romford and the same quotes were used prematurely. ‘Nobody was to blame, it was a racing injury’

I feel very strongly that we are in danger of reaching a plateau on welfare; unless we abandon the scapegoats and address the real problems.

But that can of worms will be examined on another day.

 

I have minimal interest in horseracing but given its influence on betting, it often affects the dogs.

A couple of stories caught my attention recently. One was unhappiness from bookies that 19% of races had five runners or less.

Another was that although there are marginally fewer races due to be staged next year: 1,482 (down just 4), there would be 17 fixtures transferred from weekdays to weekends.

All of which surely solidifies greyhound racing’s value.

As for gambling in general? A $22bn approach for Entain (which includes the Ladbrokes Corals brands) suggests it isn’t losing is lustre.

 

Finally – thrilled to see RPGTV becoming even more woke with its App announcing its first Asian presenter.