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Shelbourne Park race meeting to aid Omagh Fund

FOR MANY spending a Saturday night at the races is an ideal way to pass a weekend, and racegoers are going to have a chance to do it all in aid of the victims of the Omagh bomb.
Shelbourne Park in Dublin, the home of greyhound racing, is to stage a mammoth, all sponsored benefit race meeting with the entire proceeds expected to surpass £20,000 going to the Omagh Fund.
Organisers of the event were present at a prestigious press launch in Dublin at which the charity race was announced and details released about what is sure to be a night to remember, not just for regular racegoers, but the general public as well.
Already this most deserving of causes has evoked a heart warming response from all sectors of the greyhound industry, with offers of race sponsorship already pouring in.
Ten sponsors at £1,000 a time are needed for the race. Within hours of the event being announced seven people had pledged their money and support. The charity evening is the brainchild of Cathal Curley, who is a director of Shelbourne Park, and representative of Bord na Gcon. He is extremely well known in the racing world.
Cathal, who is a businessman in Londonderry, is a brother of Mary McBride from Omagh who, with her husband Donal, own the Clock Bar.
He and his colleagues at Shelbourne Park were, like many other people the length and breadth of Ireland, devastated by the news of the bomb, and want do something tangible for the many victims.
It was decided to run a race meeting with sponsorship taking the form of £1,000 each race, £60 per dog, a £1,000 prize buste draw and programme advertising
Saturday next November 21, the date set aside for the charity evening and the organisers are expecting a huge turnout from from racing fraternity.
Said Cathal Curley at the pre-launch: "We believe this evening will receive the support it deserve from the people involved in our industry, who have demonstrated so often in the past their generosity in giving to the needy. We look forward to a massive turnout Shelbourne Park on the night".