Heathcote trainer Shane Drummond is hoping Drill Sergeant is ‘barking the instructions’ in the $160,500 Group 1 TRFM Sale Cup (640m) on Sunday.

It’s “take two” for the Sale Cup after the meeting scheduled for Boxing Day was abandoned due to flooding and storm damage.

However, a $100,000 ‘reward’ still awaits Drill Sergeant if he gets the job done with military-like precision!

Ironically, Drill Sergeant is a ‘new recruit’ in middle distance ranks. He made a ‘disciplined’ debut over the ‘600’ by clocking the fastest heat win of 36.60sec – and paying $20.80.

“I was confident he could run it out as his bloodlines have measured up to the middle distance,” Drummond said. “But it’s hard to say if he’ll improve on his heat performance; I’m hoping he does.

“Occasionally, they can ‘flatten out’ after their middle-distance attempt. But he pulled up well, and he’s feeling fine.”

Breeder-owner Neil Young – also from Heathcote – transferred Drill Sergeant (Jul ’20 My Redeemer x Princess Pout) to Drummond in August.

He has raced on 16 occasions for four wins, five seconds and three thirds from 16 starts since his first start for Drummond on September 1.

“A change of scenery seems to have done him the world of good,” Drummond said. “I do a lot of walking with him along bush tracks, and he also free gallops up the straight track behind the Bendigo Greyhound Racing Club.”

A self-employed plasterer, Drummond says “greyhound training is still a hobby, it’s been that way for 25 years”.

“I wish I had got Drill Sergeant as a two-year-old,” Drummond added. “He did shift across to the right from box four in his heat, so box six in the final may not unduly worry him.

“But he’s got to get out and obtain a clear run rounding the first turn as that will play a big part in the race.”

He rates Drill Sergeant “right up there on a par” with his two best greyhounds – mother and daughter, Pepper Shiraz (a former Shepparton 660m track record holder) and Flaming Rush.

Drummond played football for Carlton Under 19s and then Coburg VFA under coach Phil Cleary – a former teacher and independent member of the Australian Parliament, and a domestic violence activist.

Meanwhile, Young – a forklift driver at ‘Epping Fruit Market’ – names his greyhounds with army related prefixes and suffixes out of respect for family members that have served the nation.

He switched to ‘Sergeant’ sobriquets after ‘Soldier’ was patented.

Young has also owned greyhounds the calibre of Dee Winter (third in the 2010 G1 Melbourne Cup and fourth in the 2010 G1 Hobart Thousand), Destroyer (a reserve for both the 2017 G1 Bold Trease and G1 Sale Cup) and more recently Untold Soldier (a provincial short-course star) – and Princess Pout (sixth in both the 2017 National Futurity and 2017 Sapphire Crown), who is the dam of Drill Sergeant.

But now to the $100,000 question: will we be doffing our “Smokey Bear hats” to Drill Sergeant in the Sale Cup?