Bogie Fury set to launch at Capalaba Cup heats

By Isaac Murphy

The Capalaba Cup heats are less than a fortnight away, and Queensland’s hottest straight track dogs have been in fine form in the lead up.

There’s been none more impressive than Ryan Ayre’s Bogie Fury, who’s a perfect six for six at the track, and the trainer is confident he can maintain the streak and go even quicker on the clock come Cup time.

Bogie Fury started his career at Capalaba late last year for the most part to avoid injury, however he’s developed into a track specialist.

“Like a lot of trainers, I’m a big fan of educating young dogs at Capalaba early in their careers so it was a no-brainer with this guy,” Ayre said.

“He’d had metacarpal troubles as a big 38-kilo dog, it was much safer to start him up the straight.

“He won in 20.06 first start there which I was happy with, then broke 14 seconds from the tap running 19.83 second up which they don’t generally do - I knew I had a good straight tracker then.

“Give him time and he’s going to be a really good chaser around the circle but watching his runs he’s just not balancing up quite right, and when you’re six for six at a track and have a Cup coming up that’s where our focus is.”

In a matter of months, the dog has graduated from a maiden to one of the hottest commodities at the track and Ayre thinks there’s more to come.

“He descended pretty quickly time-wise from that first up 20.06 all the way down to a 19.63 best, and has just been hovering around that mark- he really needs to shave another tenth off to be a realistic chance in The Cup,” he said.

“He hasn’t tackled the real Best 8 chasers there yet, obviously Columbian King is at the top of that list and I’m looking forward to the contest because when he’s challenged, I think he’ll go to another level.”

There aren’t many chasers tipping the scales at 38 kilograms, and as much as it’s helped him with his power, it’s taken the big boy a while to get up and running.

“Being a big dog, the only thing that was letting him down at Capalaba was the jump, it’s only been in his last two starts he’s broken two seconds out of the boxes and I think he’ll continue in that vein - he’s down nice and still in the boxes and times it well,” Ayre said.

“He’s always been a beast through the middle and on the run home, I think that’s where he can pick up those few extra tenths if he finds the front a bit earlier.

“It doesn’t seem to bother him where he comes out from as well, you get some dogs who like a certain part of the track, but he’s pretty professional the way he goes about it.”

Ayre is back in dogs for the first time in seven years and says he’s keener than ever, thanks largely to Albion Park Chairman and distinguished owner and breeder Les Bein.

“I was just about full-time with dogs up until 2013 where my work as a chippy and having young kids took over for a few years, I’ve only been back in dogs for the last 12 months,” he said.

“I’ve just got him in work, I was lucky with an old one of mine Molly Madness winning some masters races at Albion Park and once Les (Bein) saw me back involved he was nice enough to call me up and give me this fella.

“We go back a long way, I trained some good ones for Les and we always kept in touch as mates even when I wasn’t in dogs, I was still pretty flattered when he thought of me after a number of years.”

Ayre’s certainly no rookie, having trained some guns in the past, none better than dual-Group winner Bogie King.

“I had some good ones before I took some time off, but Bogie King was the best dog I’ve had anything to do with by a mile; he won a Group 1 National Derby and Group 2 Queensland Derby in his first 17 starts,” he said.

“He could’ve won a whole lot more as well; he ran 29.5 in an Easter Egg heat at Wentworth Park and got beat the next week, unfortunately when he came back home, he got in a fight at home with a kennel mate and was never quite the same.

“He still came back and won in Open company, and made Group finals but could never quite find that time on the clock again.”