SIS and BAGS launch Easter Eggstravaganza

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   SIS and BAGS launch Easter Eggstravaganza

SIS and BAGS today unveiled a ground-breaking Easter Eggstravaganza greyhound racing competition, boasting a prize fund of £125,000.

The unique event replaces last year’s successful Easter Bunny Inter Track competition, also run in conjunction with Bookmakers’ Afternoon Greyhound Services.

For the first time in BAGS’ history, this year’s championship will bring together all 16 BAGS tracks for a 16-race Finals Day showdown at Monmore Green, Wolverhampton.

The final will be held on Good Friday, March 29 - a day when there is no horse racing in the UK.

George Irvine, Managing Director, SIS Betting, said: "Greyhound racing is flying and the Eggstravaganza is another example of BAGS and SIS working together for the benefit of greyhound racing and the betting industry.”

The Eggstravaganza gets underway on Saturday March 2, and the preliminary rounds of the competition will provide a highlight every day for two weeks, as each of the participating tracks hosts its qualifying races.

SIS/BAGS will sponsor each track to produce its own team of six dogs from the winners of its six one-off qualifying races, televised by SIS.

The 16 tracks will then go forward to Finals Day at the end of the month and compete on a points basis in 16 races over varying distances to produce an overall winning team.

Scott Harvey, Deputy Secretary of BAGS said: “We have listened to track management, owners and trainers following the hugely popular Track Championship and have come up with a competition to keep team spirit and camaraderie flowing.

“The Easter Eggstravaganza now gives smaller tracks who struggled at the group stage of the Championship a chance for their teams to shine and win big on the day.

“And whereas the Easter Bunny had no overall winner, and no team element, just a series of finals, the new format transforms the event and hopefully should generate plenty of interest on and off the track during the month of March.”

Each of the 16 races on Finals Day are worth £2,000 in prize money, with £1,000 to the winner.

Points will be awarded in each race for the first three home – with 5 going to the winner, 3 for second and 1 point for third.

The winning team will receive £6,000 to be shared among the trainers, with an additional £10,000 to be paid out in prize money at the track.

Second prize is £3,000, with £6,000 in track prize money, with the team finishing third receiving £1,000 and £4,000 in prize money for their track.

The qualifying rounds of the competition will be held on specified dates, and broadcast live to bookmakers on the SIS main service, followed by the Finals Day races on March 29.

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Bags bonanza with an Eggstravaganza plan


Swindon's local heats will be on Cheltenham Betfred Gold Cup day



THERE has never been a greyhound meeting like the one that will take place at Monmore on Good Friday, March 29. A day when there is no UK horseracing is being termed the Easter Eggstravaganza, with the action officially described as “groundbreaking”.

There will be a record 16 finals on the lunchtime/after noon card with the current 16 Bags tracks each supplying a team of six winners from local heats, angling for a share of the total prize fund of £125,000. It is thought no single meeting has ever seen representatives from so many different tracks.

Designed to give every Bags track a shot at glory, each Good Friday race, over a variety of distances, carries £2,000 prize-money, half of that for the winner.

The team element gives five points for a win, three for the runner-up and one for third place. The top points total will give the winning track £6,000, to be shared by the trainers, with another £10,000 to be paid out in additional prizemoney at the track.

Second prize is £3,000, with £6,000 in track prize-money, while the team taking third receives £1,000 and £4,000 in prize-money for their track.

To determine the qualifiers, local heats will be staged at each Bags track in a 15-day non-stop spell from March 2-16, which includes each day of Cheltenham.

Poole gets it all under way with an evening card on Saturday, March 2, with Kinsley following on the Sunday afternoon then Nottingham on Monday evening.

Each track then takes its turn. Wednesday, March 6 features two: Hall Green's morning fixture, Hove in the afternoon.

Cheltenham week sees Sheffield on the Tuesday evening, Belle Vue on Wednesday afternoon, Crayford on Thursday afternoon then Swindon on Betfred Gold Cup day. The local element ends on Saturday, March 16 at Sittingbourne.

After this each track’s six winners will enter a GBGB-supervised draw for appropriate separate races. Greyhounds must have competed in a minimum of five graded races at their home track to be eligible to take part, one of which must have been run at a Bags meeting.

New is a dispensation for runners to be allowed one open-race win, intended to open the door for maiden race winners, although the concession applies to any category of open.

The Eggstravaganza is potentially great news for dogs such as Jims Journey (Crayford) and Mister Blue Sky (Sunderland) who won all three of their Bags Track Championship races but didn’t get the chance to shine on the big stage due to their tracks not qualifying.

Scott Harvey, Bags’ race programme controller, said: “We’ve listened to track managements, owners and trainers following the hugely popular Track Championship and have come up with a competition to keep team spirit and camaraderie flowing.

“The Easter Eggstravaganza now gives smaller tracks who struggled at the group stage of the Championship a chance for their teams to shine and win big on the day. “And whereas the Easter Bunny [which it replaces] had no overall winner, and no team element, just a series of finals, the new format transforms the event and hopefully should generate plenty of interest on and off the track during the month of March.”

Last year’s Easter Bunny saw winners from Hove (three), Oxford (two), Poole, Sheffield, Sunderland and Yarmouth on finals day; this clearly promises to be even more inclusive.

Travel allowance of £1,000 will be paid to each team making its way to Monmore.

A key pay-off for all owners is the prize-money boost for the top three teams. For example, Newcastle, celebrating its success in the recent Bags Track Championship, will shortly over a two-week period, across some 100 races, increase win money by £25, and each runner payment by £15. “That way everyone gets a look-in,” said boss Ian Walton.

He added: “The Track Championship celebrations have not stopped here in Newcastle and the Greyhound Awards should be a great night. We have a table, six of our trainers are going along and we’re all looking forward to it. Then next it’s the Eggstravaganza!”

Bags Track Championship runners-up Peterborough, who do not come back on to Bags until September, miss out on the event.

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