Late Scratching Of King Hal Cost Public £4025

Press, Volume C, Issue 29478, 3 April 1961, Page 10

Late Scratching Of King Hal Cost Public £4025

The late scratching of the 2/1 favourite. King Hal, from the Otley Handicap at the Canterbury Park Trotting Club’s autumn meeting at Addington on Saturday cost his supporters £4025. Of that amount £1065 w T as invested off-course.

King Hal was being walked round at the 10furlong starting point when his trainer-driver, C. S Donald, discovered that he was bleeding freely from one nostril. He returned to the birdcage about the time the totalisator was due to shut. Before examining the horse, the chief stipendiary steward (Mr L. A. Butterfield) and the secretary of the club (Mr D. C. Parker) rang through to the totalisator. but betting on the race had stopped a few seconds earlier at 436 p.m. and if was impossible to reopen the totalisator.

The club’s veterinary surgeon (Mr R. C. J. Mackay) inspected King Hal and said the horse was unfit to start Mr Butterfield then ordered that King Hal be scratched from the race and this was done at 4.42 p.m. Had King Hal been scratched before the totalisator had been closed for the race, the stewards could have ordered that all investments on the horse be refunded However, under the Rules of Trotting, no refund can be made when a horse has been scratched after the closing of the totalisator.

After the running of the Otley Handicap, the commentator (Mr D. B. Clarkson) announced that as King Hal had been scratched after the closing of the totalisator no refund of investments could be made. This was greeted by angry cries from all round the course.

Some hundreds of persons who had invested on King Hal made their way to the main door of the totalisator house where there was considerable discussion between members of the public, totalisator officials and four police constables. Dividends on the race had been paid out before the crowd, which still numbered about 200, dispersed at the direction of the police. Many of King Hal’s supporters claimed that their investments could well have been refunded as the race had not started.

Some club officials agreed with that contention, but said they could do nothing because of the Rules of Trotting. However, it is expected that the position will be put before the New Zealand Trotting Conference in the hones that, a solution, which will prevent a repetition of Saturday's incident, will be found.

King Hal, which is raced by Mr C. E. Dillon, of Gore is the top-ranked three-year-old pacer in New Zealand this season. It had been intended to take him to Sydney later in the autumn to contest the £4OOO New South

Wales Pacing Derby at Harold Park, but plans will have to be revised. King Hal’s trainer was informed that the horse will have to be examined by a veterinary surgeon before he races again.

The incident on Saturday was the second to have occurred at a race meeting in Christchurch this year. Investors lost £l4lO when Golden Howe dropped his rider and broke away after the totalisator had closed for the Lyttelton Hack Handicap at the Canterbury Jockey Club’s summer meeting at Riccarton on February 4. Golden Howe was not caught for some time and the field was started without him.