BRITISH CAPTAIN PLAYED A HUNCH ON RUSSIAN DERBY

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 262, 4 November 1944, Page 6 (Supplement)

BRITISH CAPTAIN PLAYED A HUNCH ON RUSSIAN DERBY

BEREZA —which in English means birch tree —won the twentieth consecutive running of the Russian Derby on September 10 before 17,000 people, states the New York Times Moscow correspondent.

Captain Arthur Cox, of the British Military Mission, played a hunch on the Derby—that's what it's called, even in Russian —and won 48,000 roubles

Russian racing is something to challenge the wits of the most hardbitten horse player, because you not only have to pick the winner, but also the second place in the same race.

The average bet is 50 roubles and the pay-off is at terrific odds—as it should be.

The scene at the Russian race track on Derby Day is not unlike the American race track on some big occasion. There is a paddock. There is a grandstand. And there is a bar, which appears to be paptronised by the same group which never seems to get away from it as race after race goes by. The programmes are more elaborate than in America. They print pictures of the horses and give many facts about them. The nomenclature was slightly startling to an old Laurel boy, however. "Meezan," "you read, "is the product of Horse Factory No. 63 and named after Marshal Budenny."

There are fourteen races on the programme. Mixed in with the regular races are trotting races, which are graphically listed as "sit-downs." After the • race the band played and fans rushed out to the paddock with tremendous armloads of flowers, which they put around the trainer's neck —not the horse's.