Get Carter is icing on the cake for Ipswich hobby trainer

By Pat McLeod

Ipswich hobby trainer Grant Franklin is living his dream.

“I have waited a long time to be in the position that I am now,” he says with his Santa Claus-like features beaming with a festive smile.

“I am doing what I love doing - spending plenty of time with my wife, my grand kids and also with my greyhounds.

“You work all those years and finally you get to the position now where life is great. I am really enjoying life and that is really satisfying.

“Everything has just clicked together.”

The icing on the cake for Franklin is a smart greyhound called Get Carter.

The Bernardo - Abby Boom chaser has a solid curriculum vitae, 50 starts for seven wins and 25 placings for $57,250 in prize money.

Over recent months he has been racing in top company and giving Franklin the thrill of a lifetime.

A highlight was his winter carnival victory in the QGOLD Emerging Sprinters Final over 520 metres when he grabbed the exceptional Bear’s Bullet on the line.

This Thursday night Get Carter and Franklin will again be in the Albion Park spotlight when they contest a heat of the annual, and very popular, Publicans Cup for fifth graders over the 520 metres. 

“He (Get Carter) is certainly growing, maturing and getting better and better all the time,” the now-retired, 58-year-old Franklin said.

“I find that the better the dog that he races the better he performs. As the bar rises his performances are better.

“Against a lesser class field he will lower his performance to their level. It was only recently when he started to race better dogs that I understood that he has genuine ability. He's also improving, his starts are better.

“He is only a length of the top dogs when he comes out and then he gets into that position about third or fourth around that first turn and that is his ideal position.

“He's not a good leader. I find his best position is three or four lengths back down the back straight and then comes home really well.”

Franklin has a family history in greyhounds and recalls being fascinated by them when he first saw a greyhound at a relative’s property when he was just a child.

That fascination stayed with him as he progressed through his own sporting career as a rugby league player.

In 1984, as a 19-year-old he was ‘picked up’ by the Ipswich Jets, who play in the Queensland Cup competition, a tier just below the National Rugby League.

However, work commitments as an apprentice boilermaker took him to Mount Isa where he went on to play in the elite Foley Shield competition as an outside back.

“I am not quite as speedy now, with a nice round figure,” he says with his trademark smile.

“It was in Mount Isa that I started as a greyhound trainer. I have to admit that when I started I didn't really know what I was doing. But, I was just trying to find out.

“I came back to Ipswich (in the mid-1990s) and continued training, but certainly was busy with work and family commitments and could not spend too much time with greyhounds. One of the main reasons I wanted to come back to this part of the world was to become involved in greyhounds here and learn a lot more about the sport.

"What really helped was assistance from (experienced Ipswich trainer) Peter O'Reilly, who really put me on the right track and now I feel more confident as a trainer."

Franklin started his association with O'Reilly over the last 10 to 15 years. 

“I am now retired and just do the dogs. I am in Ipswich and just around the corner from the track," Franklin said. 

“I only have a few greyhounds, so there is no pressure. The rest of my life is just nice, easy, happy.

“I try to keep an eye out for a good little pup coming along. I have been involved in some breeding with Peter. I just have a huge passion for greyhound racing. I believe that I have finally arrived and am doing what I love doing.”

The Publicans Cup has attracted five heats on Thursday night.

Brisbane Greyhound Racing Club General Manager of Operations, Darren Barbour, said the Publicans Cup was one of the club’s biggest nights outside of feature races.

“It is a big event at the club,” Barbour said.

“It has been around for about a decade and is a very important relationship builder between our club and the people who support our product, greyhound racing.

“From Thursday night’s heats will come the final field and each of the eight clubs and pubs involved this year will have a runner in the Final.”