All Hands Off back to her favourite track

By Jordan Gerrans

As one of the speediest bitches to ever get around Albion Park, veteran Ellangowan trainer Frederick Swain is looking forward to getting kennel star All Hands Off back to Brisbane this week.

The Northern Rivers trainer has been restricted to NSW racing with his small kennel of dogs in recent weeks, with All Hands Off having her last three starts at Lismore or Grafton.

With Northern NSW-based trainers returning to Queensland this week, Swain, who is almost 70 years of age, will be back to Brisbane Greyhound Racing Club to a track his bitch loves – winning 10 races from just 17 starts.

All Hands Off, from a Barcia Bale and Fay's Magic litter, has a career best time of 29.49 seconds around Albion Park over 520 metres, which puts her in the conversation with elite dogs such as Sequana and Black Opium.

Ahead of her return to Albion Park in a Best Eight race on Thursday night, Swain notes All Hands Off broke the track record around Grafton in a trial recently.

“I think she will go pretty well,” Swain said.

“She is beginning much better now, her first sectional the other night at Lismore, they do not usually run those times so I am hoping she can come out of the boxes at Albion Park and try and get to the front if we can.”

In the 10th event across the 12- race program on Thursday night, All Hands Off faces a small field – with boxes three and six empty – which her experienced trainer thinks can be trickier than racing against a full field at times.

All Hands Off comes from box five on Thursday evening.

Swain is based in Ellangowan, just south of Casino in country NSW, and is keen to get his winner of 22 from 37 career starts back to the Sunshine State this week.

“It is hard for top grade dogs to get a run here, she has missed out on a lot that way because you only get a start once every four weeks if you are lucky,” Swain, who trains a handful of dogs as well as a few pups, said.

“But now Brisbane is open, we will come up there.

“We got our pass on Tuesday to get into Queensland to race so we are looking forward to it.

“We do not have many options for racing down here with the borders closed.”

Trained and owned by Swain, the $93,425 career stakes earner won two of her three recent NSW starts since the beginning of August.

“She had a bit of a problem there for a few runs but we have got that fixed now,” Swain said.

“She has come back pretty good.

“She tore the webbing up there at her last start and we had to get it stitched and operated on because it was right back under her foot, it took a bit of time but she is back going well again now.”