Local and visiting stars line up for Rocky Cup heats

By Wayne Heming

Rockhampton President Mark Bube is delighted with the quality of entries for the seven heats of the club’s main feature race on Wednesday night with the eventual Cup winner taking home $75,000.

A host of local stars and some exceptionally talented Brisbane-trained greyhounds will clash with Bube excited about the battles unfolding over the 510m journey.

Local favourite Play Dirty (heat six), 2024 Greyhound of the Year Edgewood (third heat), veteran campaigner Claretown Sadie (fourth heat), and Darren Taylor’s pair, Out The Bottle (third heat) and King Eternal (seventh heat) will face stiff opposition from Brisbane invaders headed by Jeff Crawford’s litter brothers (Aston Rupee-Strike Her Pose) Star Turn (heat six) and Validate (box 1, heat seven).

Star Turn, a winner of four of his 10 starts, smashed his rivals at Albion Park over 520m in the best time of the night last month and is very well drawn in box two.

His exciting brother, Validate, who’s also been racing in great heart at Albion Park, is perfectly boxed in the red.

Also heading north is the Tom Tzouvelis-trained Simulate who recently won the $100,000  Golden Chase Final at Ipswich (520m) along with the equally exciting Selena Zammit-trained Backcreek Benny, who has strung together a picket fence of seven wins since January this year.

Simulate and Backcreek Benny have recently burst through the $100,000 prizemoney barrier.

But both are still well short of reaching the heights of another Rockhampton Cup visitor, Magistrate, trained by Greg Stella, who adds even more class to the feature race.

The winner of 34 of his 86 career starts, with another 39 placings, Magistrate has earned his connections more than $500,000 in prizemoney.

Play Dirty’s trainer Dallas Beckett said the seven heats were wide open with two or three chances in each.

Play Dirty scrambled out of box one in last week’s Wildcard Final and was the victim of severe early interference which cruelled his chances.

“My bloke wasted a lot of energy before last week’s Wildcard final so I’ve tapered him off a bit this week and hopefully he will be better suited drawn out wider (box 7).”

Beckett said Play Dirty copped an early check.

“That was the end of the race for my bloke, he never got back on the bunny after that.”

The interference also put the well-fancied Steve Scott-trained Oorah out of the Wildcard race and out of the Cup with an injured hock.

Stella has brought his kennel star, Magistrate, north in search of more glory and is one of the top fancies.

A black dog by Fernando Bale, Magistrate will take a power of beating given he comes north with an amazing record of 34 wins and 39 placings from 86 starts and more than $500,000 in prizemoney to his name.

Word is Magistrate, who had never seen the Rockhampton track, was one of several Cup contenders who trialed before the races recently and reportedly handled the track very well.

“There would have been 10 or 12 trials before the races recently and I think the best time was around 29.60s,” said Beckett.

“Magistrate is a top dog. He is drawn perfectly and will take a power of beating.”