TROTTING.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 142, 17 June 1926, Page 14

TROTTING.

WHEEL AND TRACK NOTES. (By ORION.) FIXTURES. June 19, 23—Auckland T.C. Winter. D. Bennett has taken over the stables at Addington, lately occupied by A. Fleming. D. Withers will not be over busy at the meeting as lie has. only Silk Thread and Logan Lou to attend to. Silk Thread looks particularly well. The Wellington Trotting Club has applied for the following dates for its meeting next season: December 4 and 8, February 26 and March 2. Nitaßell has been sore for some time, but this is nothing new for the daughter of Gold Bell. On race days she seems to go free enough, and earns a lot of money. Doctor Dillon, who does his work at Otahuhu, is an improving horse, but lie will be meeting some pretty good ones on the same mark "in the Campbell Handicap. •T. Bryce has made a start on Ahuriri. Last year's K.Z. Cup winner has benefited considerably by his long spell, and is in great heart to commence training operations. Her Ladyship, which at one time raced consistently in Auckland and was later sold to go South, is again at Epsom. She is in R. Mills' charge and a companion to Prince Pointer. Although the weather cleared up yesterday, the track at Epsom this morning was unfit for working on. However, it was drying well and possibly many horses would be worked this afternoon if no rain fell in the meantime. Wallroon is looking particularly well. but he will be taking on much stronger opposition on Saturday than hitherto. Still he is a very useful pacer, and if reserved for the mile the 1 first day would take a lot of beating off the limit. A Southern writer expresses the opinion that the. Cornwall Handicap would be a good thing for Logan Chief if the bay pacer were at bis best. He was walking about the track early this morning at Epsom in company with Peter Bingen, and his appearance suggests he is well.

Many are picking Direct Wood out as being particularly well placed to score | in the Hobson Handicap on Saturday. In going a shade better than 3.28 into third place at Ashburton he is certainly entitled to respect off the end of a 3.30 class, but we may take it that as he only got third last Saturday he would be doing his best and the chances are he will find some capable of keeping him busy in the Hobson. Tlie 1024 New Zealand Cup winner The Sheik, is reported to have benefited by | his holiday and is in good condition to be trained for next season's racing. The Sheik is on a itight mark, and with so many young and improving horses coming out in the best class the back markers find it hard to win races. The public like to see the best horses in commission, so it is to be hoped that clubs will freely cater for them with more Free for Alls, over all distances. The first experience in setting out to establish a winter meeting permanently in Auckland is not a happy one, and there has probably never been so much wet weather prior to a meeting as on this occasion. The grass track on which the horses will race is looking a picture but the training track, a dirt one, has bocn a quagmire for days on end. The result has been that trainers in many cases have done practically nothing but road and hill work with their teams. An application for a riding license at Sydney trotting meetings is to be made to the licensing committee of the N.S.W. Trotting Club on behalf of Gus Millsom, son of the well-known trotting trainer and driver, Gordon Millsom, who is also a veterinary surgeon. Young Millsom is only 15 years of age, but shows great promise of becoming a front rank trotting rider and driver. In the Goulburn district recently, five mounts have given Gus Millsom four wins and a second. "RINGING-IN" IN EUROPE. Xo less than eleven European countries have Ligned a paper address to the National Trotting Association of America complaining of the vague particulars of exported horses given in certificates of registration. An American, whose name is stated, is. accused of having imported numerous horses to European countries through England and Denmark, that are not the horses they are supposed to be. It has been proved that the man referred to, although bowled out in his crook work, still continues to flood Europe with crook horses. The Trotting Associations signing the paper are Austria, Finland, Belgium, Denmark, France Germany, Hungary, Norway, Holland, Italy, and Sweden.

In early Australian- trotting history horses were landed from America that were not the horses they purported to be, and in one instance a horse was sold in Sydney under the name of a Wellknown trotter of the day in America, but it so happened that it was a mare, while the American of the name was a stallion, Another horse brought out in later years by a wealthy station owner, supposed to be a highly-bred stallion with a fast record, was generally supposed not to be the horse represented, and his failure both as a trotter and as a sire upheld the contention. GREATEST TROTTING TRAINER. The death of Budd Doble in America recently, removed from the ranks of trotting perhaps the greatest of all-time trotting trainers, and, as showing his ability with the light harness horee, it is only necessary to mention the following amongst the records he had taken: Dexter 2.17J, Goldsmith Maid 2.14, Rarus 2.135, St. Julien 2.11}, and Nancy Hanks 2.4. The period beginning with 1867 and ending with 1892, a quarter of a century, witnessed epochal changes on the trotting line, the most notable being the invention of the pneumatic-tyre sulky. In the '•Trotter and Pacer*' of April l.">, Henry Ten Eyck White relates many items of interest concerning the life of Budd Doble, and these will be of' interest to many who have read of the deeds of the great old-timer. Doble, from the day in 1867 when he gave Dexter the 2.17 i mark, until he marked Nancy Hanks in 2.4 twenty-five years later, was the leading American horseman. He followed JJciio: («hidi 'Lie

the dayhis record wasrmadej and retired at the end of that season) with Goldsmith Maid, which lowered the world's record to 2.17 at Milwaukee, Wis., four years later, and gradually brought the figures down to 2.14 in 1874. Twentyone years' passed before Doble got his third champion trotter, Nancy Hanks 2.4. Goldsmith Maid started the 2.15 trotting list, and Nancy Hanks was the first 2.5 trotter. He was the leading horseman of hie day, which was a long one, and he knew it, but never did he in the slightest degree make the fact manifest by the usual signs. But of his own position lie had no doubts, and, on occasion, would express himself by acts rather than words,