The Sims name is synonymous with greyhounds in the South East – whether it be coursing or track racing.
Col Sims, ably assisted by his wife Val, enjoyed great success at coursing and later experienced no trouble in turning his hand to mechanical lure racing when it was introduced in Mount Gambier in 1979.
He was a member of the South East Greyhound Racing Club committee when racing commenced at Glenburnie.
And in 1978 he was the first to be awarded life membership of the Mount Gambier Greyhound Racing and Coursing Club (MGGRC).
Col Sims also won the final Mount Gambier Cup run at Glenburnie in 1996 with the speedy front-running Colin Ian.
He then won the first Anniversary Cup conducted at the Lake Terrace East venue in 1997 with Becker McLaren.
The Sims Feature Maiden (512 metres), which has been run in various formats over a number of years, was first conducted as a memorial event in 2013 when won by the Cap Abbott trained Arbour Darby in 30.71 seconds.
Subsequent winners have been Benara Cosmic (Tracie Price) 30.33, Andy Jay (Toni Jones) 30.31, Rowchester Star (Nicole Stanley) 30.60, McIvor Neville (Peter Franklin) 30.64.
And in the 2018 memorial, Paul Herry’s Got Some Cheek gave the Mortlake trainer his first feature win when defeating fellow Mortlake trainer Peter Crawley’s Bomber Creek by a head in 30.52 seconds.
The 2019 Val and Col Sims Memorial Maiden final had been an emotional weekend for the Sims family after the funeral on the Saturday of Ian, a son of Val and Col Sims and also a life member of the MGGRC.
But the following day the family came together at the Tara Raceway greyhound track like never before.
Winner of the race was Nifty Lenehan’s Twisted Missile, a daughter of Nitro Burst and Harper Seven, who defeated School Report in 30.50 seconds.
For Mount Gambier owner, Michael Robinson, the 2020 win by Rocketline had been a far cry from those frustrating trial mornings with the son of Peter Rocket x Headline not all that many weeks prior.
Raced in partnership with locally-based Willie Vossen, Robinson had resorted to trips to the Tara Raceway trials after Rocketline had returned from breaking-in with little to recommend him.
According to Robinson the black dog had shown no inclination to chase the lure although he gradually came good and later gave Compton trainer Tracie Price his second Sims Memorial winner.
It had been a particularly pleasing win for Robinson, associated with the Sims family since the Glenburnie days of racing when he was the Chief Steward.
Then, in 2021, with the feature maiden now known as the Sims Family Memorial, the Price-trained $34 chance Compton Brett caused a real boilover when defeating kennelmate Compton Pete in 30.43 seconds.
The following year, Moorak trainer Jason Newman landed his first feature win at Tara Raceway when kennelmates Strike Eagle and Super Cobra fought out the finish of the Sims Maiden.
In 2023 Newman and his partner Melissa Freitag made it back to back wins when Tanamera led all the way and defeated Tinker Vogue by 4¼ lengths in 30.23 seconds.
This year’s Sims Family Memorial was run last Sunday with a large Sims supporter-base on track to witness the eight-dog maiden final over 512 metres.
Box one runner Eskimo Moana, owned and trained at Coleraine by Bob Wombwell, went to the boxes a solid second favourite at $3.80 and was always going to be hard to beat after taking the lead going out of the first turn.
And in the run home, the daughter of Sennachie and Serene Rose finished solidly when defeating litter sisters Lektra Lyanna and Lektra Julie – the daughters of Fernando Bale and Lektra Perry trained at Toolong by Sharon Bradley.
