Sure it’s easier in hindsight, but if you were to glimpse through the form of Mark Moroney’s dog FireLegend, you would have been enticed to have something on him in the opening heat of the TAB Million Dollar Chase heat at Maitland on Monday night.
Moroney bred and raced FireLegend as a young dog, before sending him to leading Victorian trainer Jason Thompson to race down south. He has returned to Moroney’s kennels on the NSW Central Coast for the lucrative series, and showed he is on target to make some noise in the MDC, with a brilliant 24.88s win.
But if you take a look at the form of FireLegend in recent times down in Victoria, you will notice that he ran second to newly crowned Greyhound Of The Year Simon Told Helen at The Meadows, second to Andrea Dailly’s superstar Shima Shine at Horsham, and second at Cranbourne to the brilliant Catch The Thief.
FireLegend jumped fairly, but then got a nice cart across from his box eight draw by Aston Sapporo in the seven, and after taking the lead swinging for home, he was able to hold of Whitfield in the run to the line.
“He’s done his early racing and education here,” Moroney said. “He ran 22.2s over the 400m as a 17 month old pup so this was the obviously the choice of track for us. As soon as the race came along, we said we were going to Maitland with him.
“A lot of the experts wrote him off from the eight box but we saw him run second to Shima Shine in near track record time at Horsham of the eight, and he won off the seven at Ballarat before he came up here.
“Last week (when fifth at Maitland) he got squeezed up at the start and it was just a forget run, but we know how good he is.”
The win took his record to 37 starts 17 wins and 11 placings, and is some consolation for the disappointment Moroney suffered just a few weeks ago down the road at LADBROKES GARDENS..
Moroney was devastated when his kennel star, Fire-legend">Fire">FireLegend’s sister Fire On Ice, suffered an injury in the Group 2 Black Top Final, an injury which brought an abrupt end to her Million Dollar Chase campaign, just days before the series was to begin at her favourite track, Gosford..
The Darryl Thomas-trained Whitfield, a litter brother of Xerri who qualified for the MDC semi-finals with a Regional Final win at Gunnedah, was impressive at just his ninth start, clocking 24.99s in finishing 1½ lengths behind the winner.
“Yeah he went good tonight,” Thomas said. “He missed the start badly but got a bit of run through, and those things happen in racing. He was impressive finding the line, and he’ll definitely be better next week.”
Thomas would be delighted too with the box draw for the final, with Whitfield coming up with the one box, while FireLegend drew the two.
In the second heat it was the Jason MACKAY-trained Cursed who took full advantage of his box one draw to push through under his rivals on the first turn and that move was enough to set up the win.
The former Victorian who only joined MACKAY’s kennel last month clocked 25.10s and held out Mrs Granger and Bump Black, with Hudson Bolt hanging on for fourth and a spot in the Regional Final next Monday night.
“He dwelt at the start and then drove really hard and pushed his way through and then powered home, and we’re really happy with that,” said Jason’s daughter April. “We haven’t had him too long but he’s going good.”
MACKAY, who had two runners in last year’s Grand Final - Get It Gizmo and Flying Bazza - qualified his first runner into the MDC semi-finals at LADBROKES GARDENS on Saturday when Aston Lee finished second to Aston Zodiac. He now has more chances of qualifying dogs for the semis with both Cursed and Aston Sapporo next week.
“When he (Aston Sapporo) raced Armed Assassin here (in late July) he tore his inner pelvic (muscle) and we laid off a bit then started to work him and he has been trialling quickly, but there’s something not right. He’s easing on the corner and did it again tonight. We’ll keep trying to sort that out.”
