HEART OF ENGLAND PWRC, SHUTTINGTON on 14 JUNE 2026 – 240 yards bends, veterans 140 yards at ½yd/lb plus yd/yr
Photos courtesy of Rob Cuss, click/tap to enlarge
Ah, back to the bends. Much more fun, a proper test of a racing whippet. Where first out of the traps isn’t always the decider, and sometimes last to the first corner holds all the aces if there’s traffic. There’s the joy of watching a clever bends specialist in action, or better still, two, three or four of them.
Sunday was typical. A good turnout of 87 dogs, a lovely dry weekend, sunny and warm rather than hot, the grass looking the best I’ve seen for some time and feeling just as good underfoot. The only downer, a break-in after Heart Of England’s Spring Open and the theft of their mower and quad bike. The former meant Vince had to mow by hand, four hours’ worth to get the grass to his satisfaction, and what a great job he did; the latter necessitated a substitute quad which needed a lot of TLC to get through the weekend. Well done to Gary our Race Manager who spent much of Saturday nursing it to health, in the end it did us proud till it died before the 28lb final, meaning the last race was at ten past four rather than four o’clock exactly. We’d have settled for that at the start of the day.
We had five new Racing Champions, WCRCh’s Ameesha Little Devil, Girl On Fyre, Monochrome Magik, One Scotch Too Many and Rush About, well done to them and all the others who gave us some brilliant racing.
Veterans
The veteran finals preceded the bend finals. The veteran groups were a little smaller than usual but still plenty of quality. The 14-20lb group was a duel between Mike Head and Ilid Davies’ VC *Along Came Betty and Jacquie Mullin & Dean Leonard’s VC *London Girl, won by the former but both top veterans.
The 21-23lb group, Jacquie’s and Dean’s WCRCh VC Glad All Over looked to be back in tune with an impressive win over Dave Williams’ Odds On Willow who’s going well as a veteran, third was Maxine Thompson’s Angel Eyes and fourth Sarah Layfield’s Winterfell A Dash Crazy.
The 24-27lb final, another high-class duet, a good race. Vince and Sarah Hart’s WCRCh VC Scrappy Doo had to work for the win to beat John & Sheila Strain’s The Mighty Finn by 1¼ lengths.
The heavyweight heats were fairly close. A blanket finish for the first, Karen Bridge’s Glory Narah edged out Dave Favell’s WCRCh VC Lovely Jubbly (nine years young) and Sue Manby’s Triple Cee only a yard back. The second heat, Lynne & Alistair Holmes’ WCRCh Believe in Me beat Jo Lock’s grand bend-racer *Sea The Moon by two lengths, and in the final he prevailed comfortably, 2nd Glory Narah, 3rd *Sea The Moon and 4th WCRCh VC Lovely Jubbly.
Championship Weight Classes
The 16lb group comprised three dogs. In race 1, Liz and Richard Villis’ *Ameesha Little Devil beat Mark Jervis’ WCRCh Cheadle Heart by four lengths. The first bend final of the day, the first new title; WCRCh Ameesha Little Devil by 3½ lengths from WCRCh Cheadle Heart, with Christine Howard’s little Ryamber Trish’s Star only 1½ lengths further back.
The 18lb heats saw wins for the Villis’ Ameesha Atomic Blonde, Ian Tegart’s fine bend lightweight *Fantazi Just Like Heaven showing great early pace with Maxine’s *Girl On Fyre 2nd, and Karen Bridge’s Rock It Along. In the first semi, Ian’s little girl was again fast away to lead Rock It Along home, a word for third-placed Girl Almighty who did two good runs on the day, all three of Maxine’s dogs ran well. The second semi saw a great contest with *Girl On Fyre finding her bend feet to edge Ameesha Atomic Blonde by three-quarters of a length. That made *Fantazi Just Like Heaven the only one going unbeaten into the final.
The final was settled early on the first bend, with WCRCh Girl On Fyre sweeping smoothly around the outside, all she had to do then was stay on up the hill to win by three lengths from Rock It Along, Ameesha Atomic Blonde another length back in 3rd and *Fantazi Just Like Heaven a length more in 4th. To win a full coat on both straight and bend at just seventeen months and at the first opportunity is the stuff of dreams, well done.
The 20lb group was another WCRCh Villiers Rocketman masterclass – he runs a lovely bend – although Jacquie Mullin and Dean Leonard’s two puppies Enjoy The Silence and Silly Games made him work. We had heat wins for Enjoy The Silence from Dave Williams’ Odds On Mollie; George Whalley’s Here Comes Me Son; the aforesaid WCRCh Villers Rocketman from Silly Games after coming out better from a side-on contact on the first bend; and Christopher Booth’s Cheadle Bringer.
The first semi saw a win for Odds On Mollie from Silly Games, while in the second, Rebecca’s star led Enjoy The Silence home by three lengths. He also made no mistake in the final, a four-length win with Enjoy The Silence 2nd, Silly Games 3rd, and Odds On Mollie 4th, they all earned their dinner that night. “Routine” wins are commonplace on the straights but these races were anything but.
Mike and Ilid’s WCRCh Just Red continued her dominance in the 22lb group. She “only” had a share of Fastest Time after her heat, courtesy of an awful trap but it didn’t stop her beating Sarah’s *Winterfell What The Heck four and a half lengths. The other two heats were won by Viv Thurman’s Ooh Ah A Devil three lengths ahead of Nicola & John’s WCRCh Pure Delight, and Steve Miller’s Apache One Love beating Simon Brown’s Loopy Lu by a length.
WCRCh Just Red showed what she could really do with a time of 15.39 in her semi to claim the Fastest Time rosette outright, there wasn’t much WCRCh Pure Delight and Apache One Love could do with her speed. In the other eliminator, *Winterfell What The Heck beat Ooh Ah A Devil two lengths, Loopy Lu not disgraced in 3rd. As for the final, WCRCh Just Red summarily despatched a high-class field, six lengths ahead of Ooh Ah A Devil, *Winterfell What The Heck and WCRCh Pure Delight who were in a close race for 2nd, 3rd and 4th.
The 24lb group looked to be between Denise’s *Foxie Flyer, the Waltons’ fine all-rounder WCRCh Gimme Delight (still holding off the youngsters) and the Harts’ *Monochrome Magik. All three won their heats, also Vince and Sarah’s Charlie Brown won a close finish with Garry Comber’s Lukatme, both of Garry’s dogs ran well.
Convention is that first out of the box holds the whip hand going into the bend, but both semi-final winners, *Monochrome Magik and *Foxie Flyer were out late and went from last to first. Both know the bend track inside-out and are very capable. Lukatme edged out WCRCh Gimme Delight for 2nd in the first semi while Villiers Mighty Mouse followed *Foxie Flyer home. The final was hard-fought, three and a half lengths between first and fourth, with WCRCh Monochrome Magik claiming a well-deserved title from *Foxie Flyer, Lukatme and Rebecca’s Villiers’ Mighty Mouse.
The 26lb group saw a rematch between Jo Lock’s *Sea The Sunrise, Lynne & Alistair Holmes’ *One Scotch Too Many and Terry and Mandy’s Here Hugo, this is a fascinating rivalry between three fine bend whippets. All three, with new kid on the block Villiers Rocky Road won their heats; now to the semis where things hotted up very nicely, both blanket finishes.
In the first, *Sea The Sunrise shaded Here Hugo by a head with Garry’s Ury Got me a length down and Christine’s WCRCh Ryamber That’ll Do in 4th. The second, one and a half lengths covered the field, *One Scotch Too Many just prevailing, Villiers Rocky Road 2nd, Ryamber Room At The Top just missing out along with Ryamber Too A T. Unlucky for Christine, but these were great races, get well soon Mark.
At the last bend Championships it was Tetley, *Sea The Sunrise who had the whip hand, this time it was Hudson’s turn, to become WCRCh One Scotch Too Many he led from the first bend to hold off *Sea The Sunrise by a length, another length back Here Hugo and one length further to Rebecca’s Villiers Rocky Road, twenty months old and a fine run in top company.
“Only” five whippets in the 28lb group but two Racing Champions and a half-coat who surely would have been already “made up” but for injury. The first heat saw Gwen Heppenstall’s WCRCh Let’s Go Nuts beat Fiona Campbell’s Black Onyx (litter-brother to WCRCh Girl On Fyre) while in the second, Mark & Charlotte Bursey’s WCRCh Mach’s Kamikaze Mars led Gwen’s *Frame This Sen home.
The final was clear-cut, WCRCh Let’s Go Nuts gaining her third Champs weight class (all bends, and she isn’t a bad straights whippet either) from WCRCh Mach’s Kamikaze Mars, nice to see him come back to form. Second was Black Onyx, still very young, and *Frame Thi Sen an honourable fourth.
30lb group. Again five dogs stacked with quality and a horrible three-dog heat comprising Karen’s *Rush About, George’s WCRCh Joe Cocker and Dave & Sandra Bursey’s *Markamy’s Black Bertie, last time’s winner. They finished in that order, Bertie losing out in the trapping and the other two dogs much too cute to let him in on the bend. Sandra’s in hospital after a planned operation, again get well soon.
The second heat had rather less riding on it, both dogs going through to the final, Gary Hogan’s WCRCh Gunns Donavon leading Fiona’s Tiger Feet home.
The final was tight for the first three, a tricky one to judge from the inside. WCRCh Rush About, hugging the inside rail, shaded WCRCh Gunns Donovan by a long neck to become the day’s fifth new Racing Champion. WCRCh Joe Cocker was only a length away 3rd and Tiger Feet ran well to keep close up in 4th.
32lb group. Denise Pitcher’s fine youngster Secret Squirrel, Peter Goddard’s Mr Apollo and Graham’s WCRCh Gimme It All were the three heat winners. In the first semi, WCRCh Gimme It All won by six lengths ahead of a stern battle for second, his kennelmate *Gimme Some Action just edging out Mr Apollo; the second semi a clear-cut win for Secret Squirrel against Graham’s veteran *Rising Sun. Graham withdrew the old boy from the final, a weight class fourth a grand result.
The final was a win for *Secret Squirrel, by four lengths from WCRCh Gimme It All and *Gimme Some Action another two lengths back. Another youngster with great promise, it’ll be interesting to see how all the form pans out through the summer and autumn. I’m already looking forward to the 3rd Championships on 9 August.
I thoroughly enjoyed the weekend, hopefully others felt the same. Once again, many thanks for all the hospitality, we were truly spoilt rotten and the cooked breakfast really hit the spot!
Mark Etheridge reporting
Amazing days racing, captured well with this superb write up once again Mark, thankyou