El Grand Senor Wins AGRA 2010 Australian Greyhound Of The Year Award

At a gala AGRA Awards night held at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Adelaide South Australia the
Australian Greyhound Racing Association last Friday night announced El Grand Senor the winner of the
2010 AGRA Australian Greyhound of the Year.

It was a night of nights on the National scene with Delegates and club members coming together
from all over Australia to celebrate the AGRA Awards night.

Hosted by Greyhounds SA the company team is led by CEO Matt Corby and Chairman Roseanne Healy. They staged a glittering affair on the 15th floor of the hotel complex with stunning views overlooking the Adelaide CBD and the surrounding Adelaide hills. Each state that has staged the event since 2006, have gone to great lengths to put on an outstanding show.

Victorian owned and trained sprint sensation El Grand Senor won the Greyhound the Year from fellow Victorian sprinter Dyna Lachlan and New South Wales stayer Blue Lorian.

The winner was selected by of judges consisted of administrators and media representatives from each state and a group of national media representatives from Print, Radio and Television. The panel was asked to allocate votes 3, 2 and 1 to the three finalists in order of each judge's preference in a secret vote. Editors note: Australian Racing Greyhound had no representative on the judges panel, nor was one sought by the AGRA.

Accepting the award from Sky Racings Hilton Donaldson MGRA Chairman Eddie Caruana in the absence of owner-trainer Carolyn Jones stunned the large crowd when he announced the sprinters retirement.

He explained Carolyn had expressed to him by phone that she wasn't happy with his progress from injury and the fact that he won't be ready for a tilt at the upcoming Easter Egg in Sydney this month. So she had decided to retire the champion to a stud carreer standing at her property in Sale for the reasonable stud fee of $2000.

Eddie expressed Carolyn's delight with being judged the winner against such outstanding competion and acknowledged the achievements of Dyna Lachlan and Blue Lorian.

“He had a fantastic year winning three Group ones and was clearly the star performer of 2010”. Eddie went on to say what a fine ambassador Carolyn Jones had been with El Grand Senor and he had become a real pin up dog with the general public as well as greyhound followers all over Australia.

below are El Grand Senor's achievements during 2010.

    El Grand Senor

  • (April 2008 Black Dog Where's Pedro- Elgrando Gold)
  • Race starts: 31 – 24 wins, 3 seconds, 1 third
  • Owner-Trainer-Breeder: Carolyn Jones (Sale, Victoria)
  • Winner: Group 1 Maturity Classic; Group 1 Topgun; Group 1 ;
  • Finalist: (3rd)
  • Total Career Prizemoney: $469,450. 5th On the AGRA all time list

The previous winners of the AGRA Australian Greyhound of the Year are 2002 Boomeroo, 2003 Bombastic Shiraz, 2004 Whisky Assassin, 2005 Pure Octane, 2006 Betty's Angel, 2007 Flashing Floods, 2008 and 2009 Cindeen Shelby.

Earlier in the night under the sterling guidance of MC Sky Racing Hilton Donaldson AGRA announced the other award winners in the following categories.

2010 Brood Bitch of the Year was Rosemary Bale

New South Wales breeder Paul Wheeler accepted the award form AGRA CEO Brenton Scott. Rosemary Bale with 35 points won from Winsome Bluebird 34 and Cosmic Goddess 29.

2010 Sire of the Year was Surf Lorian

Peter Bellamy accepted the award from Queensland Racing's CEO Malcolm Tuttle.
won with 1287 points from Bombastic Shiraz 1035 and Where's Pedro 1025.

2010 Run of the Year went to Satanic Cash

For his outstanding performance coming from last and winning at Angle Park in December. Matt Corby Greyhound Racing SA CEO accepted the award from AGRA Publicity Officer Neil Brown.

The Run Of the Year was determined from the 12 runs of the month, then by a panel consisting of John Brasch (Qld), Peter O'Neil (WA), Matt Corby (SA), Peter Hayes (Tas), Brenton Scott (NSW) and Neil Brown in Victoria. They were encouraged to enlist who ever they saw fit to offer an opinion then cast their state's nomination.

2010 Trainer of the Year was Darren McDonald

On hand to accept the award from AGRA President Roseanne Healy a delighted acknowledged what a wonderful year he had and thanked a number of people involved with his kennel. Darren stating the award was one of the highlights of his training carreer that started as a young man in Warrnambool over 20 years ago.

The Victorian mentor had a fantastic year all around Australia winning group races and enjoyed tremendous success with his top line kennel stars Cosmic Rumble, Octane Show, Gardam Prince, Nova Surf and Ultra Rumble to name but a few.

The trainer of year is determined after nominations are put forward to the AGRA CEO's who cast votes at a meeting held in January. The panel takes into account a number of different aspects of the training side of things it included. Group wins, and finalists, state city wins, number of runners and dogs in work, percentage per runners etc.

The final awards of the evening were induction of members into the AGRA Hall of Fame.

The Hall of Fame Inductees

    Trainers
  • The late Doug Payne South Australia accepting Doug's award was his son John on behalf of his family.
  • The late Vivian James Berresford Tasmania accepting was Janet Berresford Vivian's wife.
    Administrators
  • The late Brian Johnstone South Australia accepting was Brian's daughter Kathy Johnstone on behalf of the family.
  • The late Noel Banks Victoria accepting on behalf of Noel's family was his wife Lois and son John Banks.

The presentation of the inductees to their acceptors was as always an emotional one with many family members and friends flying thousands of kilometers to honour the very worthy new members of the AGRA Hall of Fame.

It concluded a fantastic night which is sure to be next year. The awards night rotates from state to state and takes place in March-April each year coinciding with AGRA's Bi-Annual Meeting and Conference.

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