Greyhound Dog Races
Due to their incredible speed — the fastest dog breed in the World with top speeds at or slightly above 43 miles per hour — and their innate hunting ability, Greyhounds have primarily been bred for Greyhound dog races since the early part of the 20th Century. Racing Greyhounds evolved from their foremost function of hare coursing — basically, hare coursing [which has been around and practiced for centuries] is the hunting of hares or rabbit by sight and not by their scent. Given this was the primary purpose for previously breeding Greyhounds, it is no surprise, then, that the standard lure in Greyhound dog races is either a mock rabbit or manufactured hare.
The idea of Greyhound dog races is very simple: the dogs are loaded in to a starting gate, the lure is put in to its place on the electric rail around the track, the lure operator starts the object of the dogs’ desire, the bell rings… and they are off! All stride, legs pumping, body in complete harmony with itself, chasing the lure around the track as fast as they can go until they make it to the wire — the Greyhound lives for this type of energetic rush. They will race on either an oval or circular track for, typically, one of three distances: 5/16 [a sprint], 3/8 [middle distance], or 7/16 [marathon course] of mile — though some tracks also race 9/16 of a mile. The typical race usually has approximately 15 races and will commonly have a field of 8 Greyhound dogs. These races are often very quick, a sprint lasts roughly 31 seconds and dog speeds of around 45 miles per hour. but they are certainly not short on excitement.
Currently, in the United States, there are only 12 states with a combined 40 Greyhound dog tracks in use for the purpose of Greyhound dog races — but you can typically bet on the Greyhound races at any off track betting facility in any state that has legalized gambling. Greyhound dog racing is also very prominent in Australia, Ireland, New Zealand and Great Britain with additional, primarily small scale, amateur racing in 17 other countries — most of those being in Europe.
