SAVVA – CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER THREE – WESTMEAD

 

By the mid-1960s, Nick’s intention to find a place to train had become frenetic.

He bombarded estate agents with requests for details of properties with land within reasonable access of London.

In 1967, he was offered a ramshackle fruit farm in Edelsborough, a small village near Dunstable – ‘Westmead’. Price £9,000.

Nick says: “It was completely overgrown, a house that was uninhabitable, a pig-sty and a couple of outbuildings.

“My first job was to convert one of the outbuildings, that is now a whelping kennel, into temporary accommodation for Natalie and myself while we renovated the house. We also built kennels for the brood bitches.

“Outside, the big job was uprooting 500 prune trees and making the ground suitable for greyhounds. Although I had some help, uprooting the trees nearly killed me and took its toll on my back.

“Eventually we built the racing kennels. They were only ever meant to be temporary but we never got round to replacing them.”

For a city girl like Natalie, the prospect of living in the Bedfordshire countryside was as big a culture shock as Nick’s move to England.

She says: “Although I was brought up in London, I never liked the place and couldn’t wait to live in the country.

“I fell in love with Westmead straight away even though the whole place was a complete wreck. The surveyor took one look at it and said: ‘Don’t buy it.’

“But we just got on with it, living in London during the week and staying at Westmead over the weekends getting the place ready.

“The first place to be finished were the whelping kennels and that was where we slept.

“The house was gutted from top to bottom with only the four walls remaining. It was a huge job.”

 

Within a year, Westmead was ready to whelp its first litter of pups and in January 1968, Pincano produced 4 dogs and 5 bitches from a mating to Maryville Hi.

What few people realise is that Nick originally had no major plans for breeding. He primarily just wanted to train greyhounds.

He said: “I decided that I should try to breed my own due to the number of times I was ripped off buying dogs in Ireland.”

But soon after the first litter were born, Nick realised that he had stumbled on something that would change his life forever.

He said: “I would get up early in the morning, in the summer, as soon as it was dawn and take the pups out into the fields or nearby countryside.

“Just to watch them running and playing was wonderful. I used to play hide and seek with them, I was like a child.

“I would then have to drive to London and do a full day’s work and then take the pups out when I got home.

“They were very long days, but I don’t think I ever had more enthusiasm and energy in my life. They greyhounds became my life force. Natalie felt the same, she took to the puppies with just as much enthusiasm as myself.”

Natalie would regularly join Nick to take the pups onto the Downs for exercise at 5am in the morning.

The pair would stand around half a mile from each other and call the pups from one side of the valley to the other.

Nick said: “The ground was chalky and very rough but the pups never hurt themselves. It was so much easier in those days before the yuppies and their pet dogs arrived.”

Natalie said: “I loved looking after the pups and the brood bitches. Pincano was my special favourite in the early days. Nick would leave early for work and let her into the house.

“She used to come upstairs to the bedroom and get into bed beside me and go to sleep.”

 

As he waited for his first home bred runners, Nick’s earliest runners from his new kennel were on the flaps. He also had runners as an owner at various NGRC tracks.

Unfortunately, prior to Patsy Browne’s intervention, he had been sold one expensive flop after another.

Nick says: “Along with my brother in law, we spent £15,000 on around six to eight dogs, all at the recommendation of Bill O’Hare. Two of the most expensive were a dog called Badge Of Combat, and a Quarrymount bitch who had won the Munster Puppy Cup and cost £3,000.

“Badge Of Combat was sent to Phil Rees at Wimbledon but wasn’t good enough and was transferred to John Coleman at Romford.

“We waited until he was in bottom grade and had a punt to get our money back. He led into the third bend and broke a hock.

“The Quarrymount bitch was also disappointing and while her breeder John Mackey was in England, he asked to see her trial.

“We took her to Beaverwood and she ran into a stray piece of inside fence and broke her neck on the spot. Mackey made various promises to replace her but it never happened.”

The one bright spot was former White City runner Franks Tower. Owned by brother Theo, he had treated for a broken hock by Paddy Sweeney before joining Theo.

Tower, who looked as though he would have made a good class stayer prior to the injury, came back over four bends at Luton and won nine in a row.

 

The kennel had its first two NGRC runners on April 26 1969. Given Nick’s full time work commitment, the trainer’s licence was in Natalie’s name and would remain so for almost 30 years.

Quarrymount Mink was the first to traps in heat four of the Gold Collar at Catford. He finished fifth.

But 15 minutes later, it was the turn of Ivy Hall Jewel. The former White City top heat runner ‘soon led’ and duly became the first of many thousands of winners to be sent out by the kennel.

The unknown ‘Savva – Private’ successfully steered her runner to the Gold Collar Final.

An 8-1 chance in the betting, Jewel led to the run-in before being beaten half a length by Surprising Fella. Jewel went on to reach a string of finals including the Oxon and Golden Crest.

 

Although largely self taught, Nick has taken advice from many people over the years. In the early days, few people influenced him more than Paddy O’Shaunnessy.

A native of Glin in Limerick, Paddy was a trainer at Wandsworth for 21 years until it closed. He trained the last ever winner there, before moving onto Charlton which then also closed.

Nick says: “I was very amateur in the early days and one day I asked my local steward Ken Guy if he could recommend someone to help me.

Ken was the former head of racing for South London Stadiums and he recommended Paddy, who he had known from their Wandsworth days.

Paddy came along for an interview and over lunch I offered him the job. I said: “I want you to teach me to become a better trainer. He replied, ‘after seeing the condition of the dogs and the kennels, I think it is you who should be teaching me!’ which I took as a great compliment.

“I can’t speak highly enough of Paddy. He was very knowledgeable and very kind to the dogs. I remember one day we had a very badly behaved young dog, quite nasty and not a nice animal at all.

“The dog did something bad, I can’t remember what, he probably attacked another dog and Paddy slapped him. As soon as he did it, he was full of remorse.

“I’m so sorry boy” he kept saying to the dog. He didn’t see me, but it made me smile, he was such a gentle man.

“He was also one of the most honest men I came across. He was practically a saint. When he had been at Wandsworth he had a string of time finding local enquiries and had never been able to explain why.

“They were always dogs off trials and his explanation was always accepted. We’ll never know, but I’m convinced that there were bad things going on in the racing office, just as I had experienced at Harringay at the same time.

“They knew Paddy was the straightest trainer at the track so they would hold a few lengths from the trial times and back them first time out. Paddy was so naïve about such things that he never ever considered it.”

But tragedy struck in October 1977.

Nick says “Paddy was taken ill with stomach pains and I pleaded with him to go and see a specialist. I offered to send him to Harley Street.

“But he was determined to go on holiday in Ireland and see a doctor there. That was the last I ever saw of him. He developed peritonitis and died in Ireland. He was 68 and had worked for me for 10 years and I was very sad to lose him.”

Natalie said: “I can still remember Nick taking the phone call. It just wouldn’t sink in. Paddy was a lovely gentle old man, we all thought the world of him.”

 

Eventually the first Pincano litter reached schooling age and Nick took them to Henlow, a flapping track popular with local breeders.

Nick says: “I took them along for their first look. They were fanatically keen so I handslipped them. They all went first time. I thought they would be pretty good but I didn’t think much beyond that and decided to send them off to John Horsfall at Catford”

On May 26 1969, a Bank Holiday morning meeting, the ‘Westmead’ prefix appeared on a racecard for the first time.

Westmead Villa was beaten in the 570 yard graded race but after a couple of defeats gave her proud breeder his greatest moment in the sport to date.

Nick says: “It was only a graded race but I was absolutely thrilled. I wanted to climb the paddock fence just to give her a big hug. It was a wonderful moment that I’ve never forgotten.”

Villa would prove the best of the litter and she soon landed the kennel’s first trophy, the Catford Breeders Produce Stakes when leading home Westmeads Hi (2nd) and King (5th), who were trained by Natalie.

Another four littermates had been bought by Pauline Wallace and were sent to race in the USA.

Natalie says: “I remember the day that Pauline Wallis bought the pups. I took them out for a walk and then cried my eyes out. I didn’t want them to go.”

Eventually Nick decided to bring Villa home so that he could train her himself.

He said: “She won first time out for me in an open at Walthamstow and I had £20 at 33-1.”

More success soon followed in the shape of the 1970 Cobb Marathon at West Ham. During Nick’s first season as a trainer, Villa won eight opens and also reached the finals of the Greenwich Cup and ran third in the Crazy Paving Stakes.

The following year she would break the 700 yard track record at West Ham and land the consolation final of the Cesarewitch.

Nick had no doubt that Villa was destined to be a fantastic brood. Unfortunately, she smashed a hock, developed gangrene, and had to be put to sleep.

It was a tragic end for a fine bitch, but a remarkable debut litter for Westmead Kennels.

 

The early days at Westmead were among the toughest times, physically, of Nick’s life.

Not only was he trying to develop the kennels and facilities, he was running a factory and two shops, training a small open race string, rearing litters as well as being the father of a young family.

Nick says: “In the very early days, Natalie was able to help out with the pups and brood bitches, but when the girls came along, they took up most of her time.”

Staff came and went. Paddy O’Shaugnessy shone through but he was a non-driver and Nick either had to employ someone to transport Paddy and dogs around the country or do it himself.

He said: “I would be up early in the morning and in the summer would take the pups out at 4am to give then a gallop. I would then either beat the traffic into London by leaving at 7am or leaving it until after 9am depending on what I had on during the day.

“I would do the same thing in the evening in terms of beating the traffic, but it had to be an early day if we were going racing.”

Quite often Nick would set off for a Northern destination during the early afternoon with the back seat of the Jaguar laid flat and with three or four dogs in the back, with a three or four hour drive and a 6pm kennelling deadline.

After the meeting, a similar journey to arrive back home in the early hours of the morning, put the dogs away, eat, sleep and then the same routine again.

Nick says: “Sometimes I was so tired that I would have to stop on the way home for 15 minutes sleep because it was too dangerous to keep driving.

“The business suffered too. Things were missed because staff weren’t doing their jobs and stock went missing, but it was impossible to monitor everything.”

 

In the meantime Natalie had battles of her own. The Savva’s first daughter Lisa had been born in October 1969 followed by Nicola two years later.

Natalie found herself torn between feeding her own babies and helping out the young mothers and offspring outside in the whelping kennels and paddocks.

She said: “I don’t think I ever got the bottles of milk mixed up! Looking back it was exciting, but very tiring with long hard days. I would never want to do it again.”

Family holidays came as another distraction for Nick with races to be won, a factory to be monitored, kennels to be built and a million other jobs, but Nick remembers those days fondly.

“I discovered that the English must have their summer holidays, though they are great memories of taking the girls away and spending time as a family.”

Yet despite the huge commitment, Nick never had any thoughts about giving up his greyhounds.

He says: “It never entered my head. Looking back, I wouldn’t have done anything differently.”

Clearly though something had to go and Nick decided it would be the business. He sold off the factory in 1975 but kept the shops, which were run by Natalie, to subsidise the kennel.

He said: “We needed the income. I knew there was no money in the greyhound breeding and rearing business.”

 

The Pincano litter had been barely two years old when Cricket Dance came into season. Nick was undecided which sire to choose.

He said: “Her breeder had originally said that if I sent her back to him, he would go to Yanka Boy and rear me a sapling.

“I decided to ask Patsy’s opinion and he advised to use Yanka Boy’s father Clonalvy Pride who was getting on in years and would not be around forever. I could always go to Yanka Boy next time.”

The litter were whelped in January 1970 and would quickly establish Nick and Natalie among Britain’s top breeders.

However there we many scrapes and twists en route.

By the time the litter was around nine months old, Nick realised that he had overstretched himself financially and he decided to sell some of the litter. Six of the ten saplings were sold.

He said: “It was all very random. We used to get people here on a Sunday to trial dogs on the schooling track and I let it be known that there were for sale for £150 each.

“I think Theo had the first pick, with the dog who turned out to be the worst in the litter. I didn’t choose the four I kept, they were the last four that nobody wanted.”

Then one of the quartet, the good looking light fawn dog, broke a stifle while exercising, having almost certainly been barged into a gate post by his littermates at full gallop.

The dog spent six weeks in a cast. Nick was gutted but the pup was not written off. It would mean that he would have to be schooled after the rest.

At 12 months, Nick couldn’t wait to get the litter schooled and within a month they were winning races on the flapping tracks.

Nick says: “It was madness but I didn’t know any better at that time. I was lucky to have any pups left intact.”

At 15 months old, they were sent to Hall Green where their qualifying trials were overseen by the bright young racing manager Bob Rowe.

They made an immediate impression and Nick gradually began to realise that, due to sheer good luck, the three littermates that he had been left with, were actually better than the six who were sold.

All three, Westmeads Lane, Silver and Pride were soon racing in puppy opens.

By now, the crocked fawn dog had begun his schooling and going well. Nick was offered £200 for him and agreed the sale.

He recalls: “The guy was a flapper who said he would be along with the money on Sunday but he never arrived.”

By now Bletchley had switched to NGRC racing and the fawn was graded in.

Nick recalls: “He had shown some ability on my schooling track but was beaten on his first four or five races. I was annoyed that he never seemed to get a clear run and was ready to take him away.

“Then racing manager Bob Beckett said ‘Give him one more graded race’ which I agreed to do.

“He was downgraded a little bit and managed to lead up. Once he hit the front it was all over and he won a long way. We never looked backwards after that.”

That fawn would become arguably the most important British bred male greyhound of the 1970s – Westmead County.

Infact, the four unsold pups all win major events. The 81 pound brindle Westmead Lane won a dozen opens in 1972 including the Cesarewitch and Test and setting a new track record for Brighton’s 725 yards.

“The plodder” Westmead Pride, who was then sold on to the Mobley family, was a pure marathon specialist and won 21 opens.

That left the enigmatic Westmead Silver. As a pup, she was entered in a 645m open at Hall Green and became a very rare Westmead indeed – one with red ink in her book.

Nick says: “I remember her going to the first bend in a good position and a dog came straight across her and gave her a massive thump in the side.

“She was knocked back to last place and must have been 20 yards behind the leader. She showed fantastic pace to catch the pack. She then attached the dog who had hit her at the first bend, before going on to win the race.

“She never did anything like it before or since and I’ve often wondered what was going through her mind when she fought.

“I eventually re-qualified her and she went on to win many opens. In fact, she was never beaten on the inside hare, though she was always a bit hesitant on the outside lure. It is quite possible that she was faster than County.”

Indeed Silver went on to win the Christie Stayers Tophy, breaking the Leicester 700 yard track record, and she also ran second in the ’72 Spring Cup at Wimbledon.

 

As the kennel built, Sundays became a great social event at Westmead. Nick would stage trials for owners to see the progress of their pups and they soon became mini meetings.

Jimmy Rhodes, one of Nick’s connections in the rag trade and joint owner of Westmead Myra, began to fancy himself as a judge.

That developed into him becoming an unofficial bookie taking bets on the results of individual trials.

Things went well for a few weeks until Nick decided to have a bit of fun at Jimmy’s expense.

The shrewdie layer suddenly looked shaky as one good thing after another was turned over in trials. In the end, exasperated and having donated all his winnings back to the original donors, Jimmy hung up his metaphorical satchel.

So what went wrong?

“I took one of the rubber mats out of the traps” Nick chuckles fondly. “I then gave strict instructions on which dogs should go into that particular trap knowing that Jimmy would make them favourite.

“I don’t think he ever found out how he had been stitched up but some of the other owners had a good laugh about it.”

 

But while things were starting to come together at Westmead Kennels, the Savva family’s whole world turned upside down in 1974.

News broke that Turkey had invaded Cyprus and had annexed the Northern section.

Thousands of Greek Cypriots fleed their homes or were thrown out by the Turkish army to become refugees in their own country. In the meantime, thousands of southern based Turkish Cypriots headed north into the captured area and took over the homes and property of their countrymen. Most are still there.

Nick says: “To begin with, we couldn’t find out any information. We eventually discovered that the Turks had rounded up all the young men, including my brother Andrew, and taken them as prisoners to Turkey.

“My parents were left behind but were having a very bad time of it. All the windows in the house were smashed and they were threatened.”

Defiant until the last, Nick’s father Savvas remained in his home until eventually dying in the early 80s.

Nick’s mother eventually came to Britain to stay with her daughters. However when she realised that she was close to dying, she asked Nick to take her back to Cyprus. She died within a fortnight of arriving.

Nick had been expecting an invasion, though he was still shocked when it occurred.

He says: “The Turks had drawn up the plan to invade 10 years earlier and were looking for an excuse. Eventually, they engineered the unrest and then moved in.”

Nick’s brother Andrew spent the first month in prison within Cyprus and following protests from the United Nations over prisoner conditions, another two months in a Turkish cell.

When the prisoners were eventually returned to Cyprus, they were made to report to a police station twice a day, and had to apply for a licence to travel outside the village.

The Hajisavva family were fortunate that they did not suffer directly at the hands of the Turkish invaders, though there was violence. One house in the village inhabited by two old ladies was burnt to the ground with the ladies still in it.

Andrew says: “There was no trouble from the Turkish Cypriots; the trouble makers came from mainland Turkey.”

After the worst of the trouble died down, Natalie took her young daughters to visit their grandparents in Turkish controlled Rizocarpasso.

She said: “When we got to the village, we were told that we would have to be escorted by two Turkish policemen to Nick’s parents’ house.

“Partition was very new back then and things were quite strict. Yet when we got there, instead of resenting the policemen, Nick’s parents invited them into the house to eat with the family.”

The Turkish invasion didn’t just hit the family emotionally, they had all their land taken away. It remains within the Turkish controlled area to this day.

There was a further twist for Nick who, back in the late 1960s, had decided to invest some of the profits from his thriving dress factory on property in Farmagusta.

The rapidly growing coastal town was booming and the plan that should have guaranteed a tasty nest-egg in his latter years.

Unfortunately, the thriving town was just inside the border line drawn up by the Turkish government.

At the time of writing this book, Farmagusta remains derelict and off limits, as do Nick’s two houses, currently worth an estimated £1.5m between them.

Nick’s other piece of land, a three acre site on the shore line worth around £1m, was even closer to the border. Indeed when we visited it during the writing of the book, Nick discovered that he had an unusual squatter – a United Nations security tower.

So much for old Savvas’ advice about investing in property!

 

In 1975 Nick decided that he had to sell his major source of income, the factory in Tottenham and commit full time to his greyounds.

He said: “The factory hadn’t been making money awyway since I hadn’t been able to give it my full attention.

“I have no doubt that the clothing business could have become very big but I was never fully committed to it.”

Nick also owned two dress shops, run by Natalie, one in Hemel Hempsted and one in Luton. He had supplied them with stock from his own factories supplemented with product bought in from other manufacturers.

He said: “We kept the shops as a safeguard because I already knew that the greyhound game would never pay its way. How could it when all I could get for nine month old saplings was £150?

Looking back, Nick regrets getting out of the clothing trade when he did.

He says: “I had it made really. I had learned everything I needed to know and these were the days before the markets became flooded with cheap imported goods.

“If I had stayed in it for another five years I have no doubt that I could have become a multi millionaire

“Although money was never my driving force, I hadn’t foreseen the problems that were about to hit the greyhound industry with widespread closures.

“Five more years would have given me the cash to buy my own dog track, which is something I would like to have put my energies into.”

 

By the mid-1970s, the ‘Westmead’ brand was firmly established in the premier league both for breeding and training.

Nothing emphasised that better than the kennel’s first two English Derby finalists, Westmeads Myra and Champ who both reached the 1976 decider. (Manor would make the ’77 final)

Myra ran third but would soon be recognised as the best middle distance bitch in training.

Champ kicked on to be the country’s top stayer for Pam Heasman by landing the Leger/ Collar double.

During a brilliant era for stayers, only Glin Bridge stood between the Westmeads and total domination of stayers events with Drynham Star and Westmead Satin taking one major stake after another.

The decade brought the kennel’s only two TV Trophy winners, Stage Box (‘74) and the giant Westown Adam (’78)

The kennel supplied its first Scurry winner in the Hugh McEntyre trained Westmead Valley. The Mobley kennel won White City’s two top stayers events, the GRA Stakes and Longcross Cup with Westmead Champ’s older brother Westmead Bounty.

In Ireland, Westmead Choice was proving a prolific stakes winner for Ger McKenna.

In 1978 Nick finally laid his St Leger bogey to rest. Just six years after the gut wrenching disappointment with ‘County’, Westmead Power vindicated his sire by completing a Collar/Leger double. Although Champ had already won his Leger, this one stayed in the kennel.

 

Viewing the decade as a whole though, if there was one night during the decade when the kennel showed that it really could compete against the very best. It was 26 March 1977.

Ladbrokes had decided to stage an entirely new event, a challenge to the top six kennels in the country – the Trainers Championship.

Interestingly, Nick found himself competing against three handlers in whom he held particular respect: George Curtis and Geoff De Mulder, whose dogs he had admired long before the days of Westmead, and Phil Rees who had trained Cricket Dance for him.

The night started well when Westmead Power, still only 21 months old, ran a gallant second to George Curtis’s Get To Town.

There were two Westmeads in the first stayers division. Westmead Fun managed to secure a second for her breeder, with Westmead Top, representing Geoffrey De Mulder back in fourth.

Westmead Court finished fourth in heat three before Westmead Wonder ran a very creditable third in the sprint behind crack sprinter Foxy Copper and Derby winner Mutts Silver.

Ka Boom provided the kennel’s first winner in the next stayers event, followed by a fourth for Westmead Leader in heat six.

The traps failed to open for the penultimate heat leaving the whole competition due to be decided on the last heat – the ‘top standard’.

Westmead Special was the complete outsider at 20-1 but when he edged out favourite Sean Na Gaisce for second slot, he secured enough points to see Natalie and Geoff De Mulder share the £750 first prize with 38 points each.

 

Although Nick was still considered primarily as a breeder, the kennel’s continued success saw them take on a small number of non-Westmeads.

Among them was Ka Boom, owned by Doreen Maude (Cobbold). During 1976, the brindle had 32 opens, winning 13 including the Whitbread Trophy and the consolation final of the Golden Jacket.

She broke the 485 metre clock at Henlow, the 600 metre clock at Monmore and equalled the 620 metre record at Milton Keynes.

Nick said: “She was very fast, but not a very nice bitch in the kennel. She hated other greyhounds and she would have to travel on her own.”

The Savvas and Cobbolds became good friends and would holiday together.

Ka Boom returned to Decoy Farm and was to win the Dam of the Year title in 1982 and 1983, both as a result of litters by Westmead County.

 

 

Despite the kennel’s success during the decade, Nick couldn’t overcome an unshakable dread that the kennel would inevitably go bust.

He said: “I didn’t expect us to last. Natalie was very concerned and I thought I would have to go back to the rag trade.

“It was for that reason that I didn’t build new kennels. I also let some of the bitches go that I would have liked to breed with.”

So what changed?

Nick said: “Most of my better dogs had always gone to Bob (Morton) because he gave me a complete free hand to do with them as I pleased. It was almost like owning them myself.

“But as a result, I didn’t ask very much money for them, even the top open racers. Bob recognized what was happening and offered to give them back to me for nothing when their racing careers were over. That made a big difference.

“I also bought the stud dogs and they helped the finances just enough to keep us going.”

Westmead County was particularly popular with breeders and following the success and recent death of his sire Clonalvy Pride, he even attracted 16 bitches from Ireland.

One of the Irish bitches arrived at the kennel in very poor condition. She also had an internal infection. There was no way that Nick was going to allow County to cover her.

Nick says: “I was in a very difficult position. Her owner was one of Ireland’s top breeders; how could I possibly tell him that I thought his bitch wasn’t fit to be mated?

“In the end I decided that I would put her on antibiotics and get her cleared up. I then told her owner that it had been a bad mating and not to bother to pay the stud fee. He could pay me if she produced a litter, but I wasn’t hopeful.

“I thought no more about it until about three months later when a cheque for the stud fee arrived. The bitch had whelped a litter and the breeder wanted to register them.
“I can only leave you to draw your own conclusions as to what happeend”

 

Westmead could not have thrived without owners – and not just to pay kennel bills.

From the very earliest days, the kennels have been supported by greyhound lovers who have pitched in to do everything from walk dogs to take them open racing, and all jobs in between.

Nick says: “Derek Jones was one of my earliest owners. He was a builder who lived in London and he bought Delroney Leader from me as a pup.

“He would leave home early every morning and come and help me walk the dogs before he went to work.

“The NGRC allowed him a licence, even though it was against the rules because he was an owner in the kennel and Derek paraded many dogs for me.

“He had such a determined nature that I am sure it transmitted itself down the lead. He expected to win every time and in many cases we won races that I didn’t expect to win.

“Derek really embraced everything that I felt for greyhounds. He was passionate about the game and a genuine enthusiast.”

David Sharp, the owner of Westmead Bound, also became another very close friend. He lived locally and spent a great deal of time helping out, whether it was schooling, walking dogs or taking them racing.

“Like Derek, he had tremendous enthusiasm for the game and the dogs really responded to him.”

And very often, the helpers find themselves dragged into some of the dramas that accompany handling livestock.

Nick says: “I remember one day Derek Jones came into the yard with four dogs including Stage Box. At that time we had a couple of cats who we had inherited from builders who had been working on the kennel.

“That particular morning the male cat ran into the yard and within reach of the four dogs. The first I knew was Derek screaming his head off as the dogs attacked the poor cat.

“Suddenly, the cat’s sister came running from the nearby garage and attacked the four greyhounds. She was so brave that she distracted the dogs long enough for her brother and herself to escape. I couldn’t believe my eyes. She showed the sort of qualities of selflessness that only special humans are supposed to exhibit.”

“I took the male cat to the vets who did his best but did the kindest thing and put him to sleep. The female learned to stay out of the way of the dogs and lived with us until she eventually died of old age.”

Like kennel stalwart Paddy Dunne, David Sharp, Derek Jones and the longest serving supporter of them all, Bob Lowth, all shared Nick’s ideals.

Bob was a welder by trade but also a keen dog man who raced a number of hounds with the ‘Alsucaan’ prefix (the two letters from the first names of his four children) at Milton Keynes.

He first arrived at Westmead in 1985 with a pup to be schooled and has been a twice weekly visitor (Wednesdays and Sundays) ever since.

He said: “I would help school pups, let the racing dogs out during the evening, walk dogs, you name it.

“I also helped out on track maintenance, helped with the track fencing, whatever needed doing really.

“Sometimes Nick would ask me to take a dog home if he wanted it kept in isolation, or I’d have the occasional racing dog for him.

“No money has ever changed hands, its not that sort of relationship. Anything I ever wanted, Nick would give me, he is incredibly generous.”

There was though just one very small downside to the relationship as Bob explains with a smile. . .

“Everybody at Milton Keynes knew about my friendship with Nick and whenever I had a winner, I’d hear, ‘that looks like another one that’s come out of Westmead.’ I never got the credit of having a winner!”

Nick says: “In many ways Paddy, David, Derek and Bob were so similar to me. They were non-gamblers who sought no reward and just took great joy in being involved with these wonderful animals.

“Sadly we lost Paddy several years ago, but David and Derek grew disillusioned with the game because of the way owners are treated by the tracks and the NGRC. I feel privileged to have known them. There must be thousands like them, also lost to the game.”

 

It was during the 1979 Derby that Nick received a desperate phone call from a Northern Irish trainer in a severe jam.

It came from a man widely acknowledged from his successes on Irish tracks and coursing fields, a fine sportsman who would become a close personal friend – Colm McGrath.

Nick recalls: “Colm arrived in England with four dogs for the Derby and was due to stay at a kennel near Dunstable. When he arrived he wasn’t happy with the facilities and phoned Paddy McEvoy in a panic. Paddy suggested that I might be able to help.

“I told him that I didn’t have any room but I would make some so he could stay overnight by transferring some young dogs from the kennels back into a paddock. By the time he arrived it was 10 O’clock at night.

“The next morning he had a look around the place and was so keen to stay that he offered me half the prize money if any of his dogs won the Derby. I couldn’t accept that of course but we managed to find room for him and we became firm friends.

“In the following years, Colm became a frequent visitor and we had a lot of good times.

“I recall one year he wanted to back his dog ante post and he brought over a suitcase stuffed with £100 Northern Irish bank notes. The dog was was 66-1 and Colm wanted about £20,000 on him.

“Three of us set off the next day to place the bets on but it was a farce. Nobody knew what a Northern Irish £100 note looked like and the bookies laughed at us; we might as well have tried to bet with Monopoly money. In total we got around £1,000 on the dog between the three of us.

“The head line in the Sporting Life the next day was ‘COUP!’ I don’t think the dog survived the first round.

Colm continued to be involved in the kennel including buying two young open race littermates, Westmeads Kim and Milos.”

Conversely, when his young sire Glenroe Hiker – one of the original quartet given overnight refuge at Westmead – was failing to attract the number of bitches that his owner thought he deserved, Colm gave the dog as a gift to Nick.

That inspired move would have a major effect on both the kennel and British breeding during the next decade.

Sadly Colm McGrath passed away in 2019