Short Stroll was a runaway winner of the J B Riney MBE Anniversary Cup last Saturday evening confirming his favourite tag of 4/5 on.

His winning margin of six and three quarter lengths underlined that he was in a different class to his five opponents, especially after being bumped around the first bend.

Once in front after the first full circuit, he gradually drew away from the opposition.

Trainer Patsy Cusack must be delighted with his dog’s showing over this distance of 714 metres and it could well be that we are looking at a greyhound who could well go for the 2013 Ladbrokes Golden Jacket here next February.

The track has been running lightning fast, as is to be expected at this time of year, but some results still stand out. The weekend certainly produced some eye-catching winning times.

In the Open race over 540 metres, Brave The Times, trained by Derrick Atkins at Henlow, recorded a fast win time of 33.51 seconds. The dog’s sectional time of 12.76, which is for the first 160 metres, is about as fast as you will see here and put the dog on the way to what will be one of the fastest win times seen here this year.

Make no mistake this is a decent greyhound that has won Open races at no fewer than seven different tracks and if and when he returns to Crayford he looks a sound bet to win.

On the graded front, Gemara also ran well against the clock coming home in an A5 race over 380 metres in a super fast time of 23.39.

The Racing Office made the going 0.20 seconds fast so the record book will show his adjusted time as 23.59. However, you have to only look at the results of the 11 other races on that card to realise that this was an excellent performance.

His win time was 0.45 seconds quicker than the other eight races over the distance which equates to over five lengths in running. Make no mistake, if he repeats this sort of run, he will win again despite an upgrading.

My youngster for you to follow is Clareen Vella who won in just her fourth career race. What is impressive is that she is not two until next January and is, therefore, still learning. She came out of the traps plum last but worked her way through the field with a lot of commitment to win.