A fairy tale year has continued for Sam and Stephanie Tyler, with the young Gippsland couple named as winners of the prestigious Ned Bryant ‘Silver Fox’ award at Friday night’s Victorian Greyhound Awards ceremony.
The award recognizes outstanding achievement in the training, breeding, or promotion of greyhound racing.
The Tylers, who are based at the small town of Boisdale, have successfully juggled work, Sam as an electrician and Steph a school teacher, with raising a family, sons Henry and Davey, to live out their greyhound racing dreams.
Steph was born into greyhound racing, with the husband-and-wife team’s increasingly well-known and successful ‘Collinda’ prefix deriving from her aunty Colleen and mother Linda.
The ‘Collinda’ line goes back to the 1970s, with Steph’s dad Laurence Cameron and uncle Don Cameron, and has been well and truly catapulted back into the limelight over the past 12 months.
It’s been through the hard work and dedication of Sam and Steph, who are hands-on throughout the entire process, breeding, whelping, rearing, breaking-in and training.
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The Tylers hit the jackpot with just the third litter they bred, the outstanding May 2019 Zambora Brockie x She’s A Collinda mating.
While it was a heart-wrenching decision to transfer headline acts Collinda Patty, True Collinda and Collinda Lady to champion trainer Jason Thompson, the tough call has paid a handsome reward.
After breaking champion Dyna Double One’s Sandown 595m track record at her middle distance debut last August, Collinda Patty won the Group 3 Speed Star (600m) at The Meadows at her next start.
She then returned from injury to contest the G1 Rookie Rebel, Listed Cup Night Stayers and run third in the Listed Pink Diamond Champion Distance Final at Ballarat, before winning the G1 Queensland Cup in the first week of the new racing season.
Collinda Lady was a finalist in the G1 Sandown Cup, while True Collinda was a two-time G3 finalist in the Great Chase and Shepparton’s Northern Districts Cup (third), before contesting the inaugural TAB Phoenix at The Meadows.
With her passion, knowledge and enthusiasm, Steph became an unofficial face of the Phoenix, and proved to be an invaluable asset in promoting the new event.
