Brindlebabe Posted November 6, 2008 Report Share Posted November 6, 2008 Where are Walthamstow's ex- racers? 05.11.08 Greyhounds UK have an excellent letter published in today’s Racing Post, announcing the publication of their Walthamstow data. Dear Sir Walthamstow closure Today Greyhounds UK has published its analysis of the greyhounds which ran at Walthamstow shortly before it closed in mid-August to identify how many dogs have gone on to establish stable lives elsewhere. The data is on our website www.greyhounds-uk.org which has the facility to accept update information on any dog. We intend to do the same for dogs displaced by the closure of Reading racetrack. This analysis concentrates on the 399 dogs of Walthamstow-attached trainers and is entirely factual. It contains no judgments and uses only information publicly available or from anyone having direct knowledge of specific dogs. The initial results of this analysis were passed to all relevant trainers, kennels, the BGRB, NGRC, and RGT and any comments received have been included. So what did we find? Broadly, 60% of the dogs have definitely established stability elsewhere. However, 38 dogs have not been seen in public since Walthamstow closed; the remainder have not raced with a frequency likely to pay their keep for two and a half months. This is very worrying in itself without considering the future viability of dogs displaced at other tracks by ex-Walthamstow arrivals. What we have done for Walthamstow is the product of the efforts of one Greyhounds UK analyst in his spare time on a home computer – literally one man and his dog. So why hasn’t the greyhound industry, with all its money and resources, done full analyses of the destination of every dog at every track – and published the results? This week’s disclosures in the Sunday Times of the ending of the lives of discarded greyhounds in such ruthless and shameful fashion should make the promoters and bookmakers realise that they have to sign up to openness and guarantees for the dogs’ futures if their businesses are not to be overwhelmed with sleaze. If the Greyhound Board of Great Britain is to be any different from its secretive predecessors, it must get a grip on this issue. Yours faithfully Annette Crosbie To view the analysis of Walthamstow track closure please click here http://www.greyhounds-uk.org/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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