Topgun – The event that fuels great debate

This weekend the panel will meet to determine the interim Sportsbet Topgun and Sportsbet Topgun Stayers fields, after invites were sent out earlier this week.

For transparency, I’ll be part of the selection panel (along with Scott Wuchatsch as chair, James Van de Maat, Luke Gatehouse, Peter O’Neill and Shaun Mathieson).

Last year, changes were made to the selection criteria. Historically, the fields have been selected largely on Group racing performances, with status of wins favoured over raw performances.

As has been a hot topic in the past 24 hours, with the Million Dollar Chase the focus, what does Group status actually mean in the modern era?

Current criteria provides the selection panel with greater flexibility to choose any nominated greyhound, ultimately encouraging the best possible fields to be produced.

The fans deserve the best possible field.

And in an era where it’s incredibly hard for greyhound racing to break into mainstream sports and news bulletins, this type of criteria gives the sport a better opportunity to promote itself outside the greyhound racing bubble.

Would punters rather watch a race with a field restricted to feature race winners? Or does the addition of a few rising stars, with limited exposure but untapped potential, better whet the appetite in a race like a Topgun?

Whichever way the selections go, you can guarantee opinion will be divided. And that’s fantastic for our sport.

That’ll be no different at the selection table.

It’s one of the year’s best events, every year. It gets people talking about greyhound racing and that can’t be undervalued.

The fields will be announced Friday November 1 and box draws conducted on Silver Bullet night at The Meadows Monday November 4.

Topgun night kickstarts the Dream Chasers Festival on Saturday November 9. Once again the event will be live on Racing.com – as well as Sportsbet Melbourne Cup heats, Sportsbet Melbourne Cup final and the Phoenix.

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