MEETINGS TO COME.

Auckland Star, Volume XXII, Issue 145, 20 June 1891, Page 3

MEETINGS TO COME.

Juno 25—Hawke's Bay Winter Sleeting July 11—Wellington Steeplechase meeting August 13— N.Z. Grand National Meeting

AUSTRALIA. July 11—V.R.C. Grand National Hurdle Kace. July 18—V.X.C. Grand National Steeplechase.

TH3 PAST SEASON.

Our racing season in tho Auckland province is now at an ond, and a glanco through the records shows that it has been a busy one. Taken all round, tho many clubs have had a successful financial year, and when the

complete totalisator records are made up in August I think ib will bo found tho amount put through the machine has been in e xces3 of last season. I find that during the season just concludod the Auckland Racing ClubCcmmistee parsed 60 race progvammea, bub it may be mentioned several were for meetings in and near Gisborne, which centre is incorporated in the Auckland metropolitan racing district. Added to the 60 programmes passed, the A.R.C. held their usual four meetings during the season, while four combined trotting and pony gatherings were brought off; co, considering many of the programmes passed were for meetings extending over two and three days, there was sufficient racing to satisfy the greatest turf gourmand. In faeb, considering our population and number of race-goers, ib is open io debate if the number of meetings held did not average moro than in oaeh of the two big Australian centres, Sydney and Melbourne. Although tha Auckland Trotting Club held a gathering at Potter's Paddock in the iirat week of Septomber, racing proper did nob commence till the Pakuranga Hunt Club Meeting on the 18th of October, when Orlando gave us a taste of his quality ]by winning the first ovenb on the programme, the Open Hurdle Race, while the pged Hurricane, admirably ridden by Mr Thos. Craig, carried off the Hunt Club Cup. It would be wearisome to go through the different meetings held. I may mention that "'class "has never been more fully represented at an Auckland meeting than at the A.R.C. Summer, when the visiting horses Crackshot, Medallion, St. Andrew, Strephon, Lebel, Dudu, Jenny, Rosefeldt and others, competed. against our local contingent, while tho head-quarters of Auckland racing were also favoured in the autumn with Mr S. H. Gollan's Hying pair of fillies, Tiraillerie and Naotna, whom we all hope to see capture the A. J.C. or V.11.C. Oaks in the corning spring. So far as our own two-year-olds are concerned, we can boaat of a promising colt in The Workman, end I don't forget the way he spreadeagled his field in the Welcome Stakes lasfc [November, and his second do Label in the Great Northern Foal Stakes on Boxing Day. Orestes is a colt I've always had a fondness for ever since he was a foal at ByWia Park. His two-year-old form has bepn disapyjointing, owing to being overgrown, bat I shall be disappointed if he does not race well during next season. He has all the makings of a Derby colt. In the same stable as Orestos is Dishonour (Freedom's brother). He has run several very fair races, and is endowed with ■ a good dash of pace, while a gainer youngster never looked through a bridle. ' Now that Hilda has gone to the stud, Cissy is the best all-round animal we can claim owning. She showed consistent form at the three meetings she took part in at Ellerslie, and at the Spring Meeting was the heroine oi' the hour. The performances of Reprisal and Leolantis put them among the' secondslase division, and the best local threo-year-old seen out during the season, I think, was the gelding Impulse, and it is just likely Regel, the North Shoreowned colt of the same age, \a not one pound behind him, at any rafce over a six luriong or one mils course. Ib was a great pity PJogel v.ent amiss at the Takapuna Meeting in January, or else no doubt we would have witnessed in the autumn one or two goo.] contests between the pair. Tha hardest-worked animal during the season has been Leorina, ■who has started in no less than 43 races, 'thus putting up a record for the colony in this respect. Under level welter weights Leorina has no equal in this province. Octopus stands out as the bero of the Selling Races, and "punters" who have consistently backed tho son of Izaak Walton have had no cause to regret it, for be has been almost invincible in this class of contests. In *be jumping division, we have seen out a trio of really first-claea horses in Sentinel, Satyr and Orlando, and it's a great pity the last-named is not still in the land of the living, so that the Australians might have got a taefee of what he showed in Auckland. As I said above, the season has been a wonderfully successful ono for the club 3, and this despite the depression that exists. The A.R.C. %re how about to engage on drawing up their next season's prolamines, and from what I hear it is contemplated to make several changes, with a view to increased popularity among the horse-owners and public.