Hebridean Black continued his tremendous run of form with a dominant win in the opening TAB Melbourne Cup Prelude Series at Sandown Park on Thursday night.
He found the lead earlier than expected and from there was unbeatable. Since he resumed racing in September he’s been undefeated from four starts and with his Prelude win has locked away a spot in heats of the world’s greatest greyhound race.
“I was hoping he would settle just off the speed and finish over the top of them but once he got to the front he was always going to be hard to beat,” said co-trainer Ian Cockerell.
Hebridean Black, or ‘Alex’ as he’s known named after Madagascar’s Alex the Lion, had a break from racing throughout the mid-part of the year after Cockerell identified an issue preventing him from performing at his best.
“He’s always shown a lot of ability for us since he was a puppy. It came to a point where we’d get a run out of him and then he’d be sore, we realised he had a fractured metacarpal which healed on top but there were still issues underneath.”
“We had it scraped, gave it time to heal and he’s come back a different animal. It took us a good five months.”
Cockerell co-trains with his wife Lisa and their 11-year-old twins Taylor and Morgan. They own ‘Alex’ along with Lisa’s mother Marlene Dopper.
“They’ll be stoked. He’s Taylor’s dog, he’s brought him through since he was a puppy, Lisa and Morgan do a heap of work with him too.”
Cockerell said across their years in the sport they haven’t had a better TAB Melbourne Cup contender than Hebridean Black.
“The last three weeks he’s shown a bit of box speed which he’s never shown before, he can put times on the board that can be competitive with anyone but he does need a bit of luck.”
“We take things week by week with him. We’ll give him a rest for a couple of weeks then give him some trials in the lead up to the heats.”
Their win was in the final TAB Melbourne Cup Prelude of the Series 1. The Prelude prior was won by Invictus Rising for trainer Gus Selkrig who was enormous when running down gun sprinters Koblenz and Barooga Smoke.
The opening Prelude was won by Carry On Angel for Tim Britton. He began beautifully and set up a race winning break, he won comfortably from the fast finishing Weblec Blazer.
The next series of TAB Melbourne Cup Preludes is on Thursday October 28. The four-dog Shootout and final Prelude Series will follow it on Thursday November 11. Heats of the TAB Melbourne Cup will be run Friday November 19 and the final of the world’s greatest greyhound race the following Friday November 26.
