A night at the Wimbledon Greyhound track with retired greyhound owner: Bob, Londoner

Bob is chair of the Wimbledon Greyhound Owners Association. He has been chairing for the past 10 years, and joined the committee as an 'owner' years before when he first became an owner of three race dogs (all of which are now retired and live in his family home in Croydon). We meet Bob as he gives us an insight into the disappearing world of greyhound racing
1000 LONDONERS
This film is part of 1000 Londoners, a five-year digital project which aims to create a digital portrait of a city through 1000 of the people who identify themselves with it. The profile contains a 3 minute film that gives an insight into the life of the Londoner, as well as their personal photos of London and some answers to crucial questions about their views on London life. Over the course of the project we aim to reveal as many facets of the capital as possible, seeing city life from 1000 points of view.
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1000 Londoners is produced by South London based film production company and social enterprise, Chocolate Films. The filmmakers from Chocolate Films will be both producing the films and providing opportunities to young people and community groups to make their own short documentaries, which will contribute to the 1000 films. Visit chocolatefilms.com
Transcript:
Wimbledon unfortunately has not been looked after very well and the stadium has suddenly become more and more dog-eared I would say. Erm it's sad to see but it's still holding greyhound racing so we have to be thankful for that. It's alway best to back a dog that's named after a family member - somebody that you know. Race 5 King Dan - well everybody knows a Dan. So what's happening now is that each of the dogs has been checked by the vet and been checked by the racing manager and they're fit to race. They'll each get a selected kennel that they'll be put in and they're all locked away until their race time. You know over time I've owned many dogs I've got three at home at the moment which all raced. There's Emily who's racing name was Josie and Jack and I've got Hawaiian Honey who's known as Gabby and then I've got Big Stanley who was actually bought for £50 in the car park at a dog sale. I've had dogs all of my life yeah but probably nothing that compares with having a greyhound. My biggest racing success was, I was very fortunate to own a dog called Pigalle star and I went to Romford one night - travelled all the way on the train and she was in a final - she was the outsider of 6 by the first bend she was clear by about 6 lengths, I was standing on the winning line - you could've heard me shouting all the way back in South London. Am I a competitive person? I suppose I am - through my greyhounds. I mean I'm not really built for speed myself but I love animals that are athletes. So what should we be looking for - 1 and a 4. 1 and a 4. The track used to be on two sides, used to hold thousands of people now there's not so many people come through the door and it's more towards the people that want a burger and a pint rather than perhaps people that are interested in dog racing. It makes me really sad to see people don't want to come out and spend a really great evening watching superb athletes like greyhounds are. £18.75 on that one! You don't have to have much money, it's not much to get in, it happens every 15 minutes - you can get close to a greyhound - you cant necessarily get close to a race horse.

[@tearudown]

Were about to start filming a oral memory capture of Greyhounds at Wimbledon stadium, would it be possible to use some of this material in support? Were a heritage charity & part of this project is to reinstall the Mick the Miller mosaic at the stadium , great work by the way