TROTTING.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 181, 1 August 1936, Page 20

TROTTING.

AUSTRALIAN PACER.

LAWN DERBY'S VISIT.

QUESTION OF EXPENSES,

According to information to hand from the owner and the trainer of the Australian champion pacer Lawn Derby (2.3 1-5), it is only a question of the New Zealand Metropolitan Trotting Club agreeing to pay the expenses of the horse and trainer to New Zealand for Lawn Derby to be at Addington in November. This the club is prepared to do, provided the horse does not win the amount at the club's spring meeting, says the "Christchureh Star-Sun."

"Owning a champion pacer in New South Wales is a worrying business," said Mr. J. F. Mackenny, the owner and breeder of Lawn Derby. "I do not know what to do with my horse. If he continues to race on Sydney tracks he will ruin his prospects in big races, which will be in New Zealand, at Adelaide and at Perth, so it looks as if patrons of the sport in Sydney have seen the last of this groat horse."

Lawn Derby is only five years old, but during his brief racing career he has won everything worth white, and is now regarded as superior to Walla Walla (2.2 3-5), and the greatest pacer Australia has produced. A World's Record. Lawn Derby has proved himself a real champion, with or without hopples, and very few horses can claim such distinction. At the last Sydney Show he established a world's record by pacing a mile on the show ground track in 2.3 1-5. No other horse in the world has ever done that time on a track that is three laps to the mile.

That is true, but it must be remembered that there are no tliree-furlong tracks in New Zealand or in America. The smallest trotting circuit in the United States of America and in New Zealand is four furlongs. The record in America over a halfmile track is 2.1. Dan Patch achieved that distinction in 1905, but his performance was aided by a windshield. In 1028, Single

G. paced the journey in 2.1, and in the same year Winnipeg registered a similar performance. In New Zealand the fastest time recorded over a half-mile track is 2.5. This stands to the credit of Harold Logan. Indianapolis has done 2.1 2-5 on a six-furlong circuit. Lawn Derby's achievement of 2.3 l-o on a track which is much less than four furlongs is a remarkable performance and his admirers are justified in regarding him as a champion. , Lawn Derby's presence at Addington would be welcomed. A race with Indianapolis and other pacing celebrities from the Commonwealth and the Dominion would be a big attraction.

Interviewed recently by a representative of the "Sydney Keferee," the astute and capable trainer of Lawn Derby, J. O'Shea, said that the horse would not race again on Sydney tracks, as he has no opportunity worth while. He might race at the Wollongong meeting because the conditions would make it impossible for the horse to make fast time. Alter that meeting Lawn Derby would take up stud duty, unless an attractive offer was forthcoming from New Zealand. "The horse is here, and so am I," said O'Shea, "and we are both available to go to New Zealand if the clubs make it worth while."

O'Shea then pointed out that it would not be advisable to race Lawn Derby again in Sydney, where he would probably be forced to make fast time, and this would ruin his prospects in other parts of Australia and in New Zealand. The horse won at Harold Park, Sydney, on July 6. from a 3.24 mark over a mile and a half, in 3.20 4-5, and he is now assessed on 3.21 in New South Wales.