28/11/2023
It’s been a minute since Lena Jinx smacked the 730m track record, so I had a quick chat with Gavin Harris about the run, his thoughts about the little blue chaser and what he looks for when breeding stayers.
“I was super excited about Lena Jinx’s track record, have been planning for several months to get her over the distance after she won her maiden with a last section split of 12.48 seconds over the 530m”
“My passion in the sport of greyhound racing is for staying events, so I mainly breed from bi***es that can run at least 600m and preferably 700+m. I also make sure they have plenty of galloping when I rear them and use a rotary walker to maintain their fitness between races”
Asked about the “Jinx” part of his dogs names “My daughter came up with the names Jinx and Lucy when she was 8 years old, she is now 27 years old. I continued to name the progeny of Springvale Jinx with the Jinx suffix”
“Lena Jinx is a Great Grand Daughter of Springvale Jinx who competed in 22 group finals throughout Australia, her best performances were 2nd in Sandown Cup 2004 and 3rd Sandown Cup 2006. I bought the two sisters Springvale Jinx and Springvale Lucy for $500 each as pups, Lucy went on to win the last two Marathons held at Sandown”
“Lena’s dam is Luna Jinx who won $260,000 in prizemoney, the highlight of her career was winning the Group 1 Super Stayers race at the Meadows in 2015 and running a sensational time of 41.34 seconds over the Sandown 715m. Luna won 5 races at Sandown and 5 races at the Meadows, plus other interstate races at Cannington and Albion Park. Len and Robyn Ketelaar use to train my dogs when in Melbourne before they retired”
“I hope Lena is as good as her Mum but I will have to be patient and see how she handles the travel and can see if she work her way through fields”
Definitely a dog to keep an eye on - Wow, what a run!
