RACING GAY FILOU MAY WIN GOLD CUP

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30286, 12 November 1963, Page 4

RACING GAY FILOU MAY WIN GOLD CUP

Feature Tomorrow At Riccarton

The Riccarton-trained Gay Filou may become the first winner of the new-look Canterbury Gold Cup on the second day of the New Zealand Cup meeting tomorrow.

The Canterbury Cup has been changed from a weight-for-age race to a limited handicap, and the distance has been reduced from a mile and a half to a mile and a quarter.

The response to the change has been heartening. There are 13 acceptors, and notable runners include Great Sensation, Beauzami, Picaroon, Gauntlet, and Blyton, horses with New Zealandwide reputations.

I The first running of the Canterbury Gold Cup as a j limited handicap Is the I starting point for another ! campaign for the remarkable Great Sensation. I Great Sensation has earned I greatest fame for his three ! Wellington Cup victories, but he has beaten the best availjable at weight-for-age as i well, and few of the others I will be backed with much j confidence to beat him, i though he has not raced I since the autumn. ' Two years ago Great SenI sation made a successful j fresh start in the Canteribury Cup. Last year he was second to Stipulate in that : race. Solid Record I Gay Filou had his first j weight-for-age test in last | year’s Canterbury Cup and Iran third. } He made steady improvei ment in the next few weeks land looked little inferior to I Stipulate and Even Stevens ' when he finished third beI hind them in the Clifford 1 Plate, run over a mile and a ' quarter at weight-for-age at I the Auckland Cup meeting. | Just before he started his j Auckland campaign he ran Stipulate to a length in the | weight-for-age Queen Elizai beth II Plate at Pukekohe.

In some ways Gay Filou was one of the unluckiest of the stayers last season. Luck of the running deserted him in the Auckland Cup, in which he was fourth. A check near the three furlongs virtually put him out of the race in the Wellington Cup. Gay Filou has come back this season looking brighter and better than ever, and a programme of sprint races in the last few weeks has brought him to a high peak of fitness. Gay Filou has 8-0 and is a stone below Great Sensation and 131 b below Beauzami. winner of the New Zealand Cup last Saturday, and the weight-for-age Harcourt Stakes at Trantham at his previous start. In Great Form Beauzami is hardy and consis’lenit, and a wellseasoned form runner in the hands of one of our best tactical riders, G. F. Hughes, is an obvious prospect. In the normal course of events he would not be wiitthin a stone of Great Sensation for ability in a long race, but this is quite a different thing. Beauzami beat Picaroon in the Harcourt Stakes and again in the New Zealand Cup, and it will be surprising if the Hastings cup’s specialist manages to reverse that trend. Blyton will be a second strong runner for Auckland stables. She raced without luck at the Wellington spring meeting, where her best was a fourth in the Wainui Handicap. She was one of the top three-year-olds last season, and she is now shaping as

if she will come right back to her best. Her good gallop at Riccarton yesterday was i particularly encouraging. Gauntlet, another big winner from Auckland, has not managed to win a race so far I this season, but he has come I close at times. He was narrowly beaten by Wilful in the Pearce Handicap at Trantham, and was a close fourth in the Watties’s Gold Cup. won by his stablemate. Count Filou, at Hastings. The North Island has another form runner in Sir Barton, a strongly-finishing second in the Riccarton Handicap on Saturday. Riccarton will put three three-yeer-olds into the field. Unless the ground is firm Boundless will probably And this one much too difficult. Valuate’s Derby third did not look good enough to give him a chance, and Magician failed against Beauzami and company in the Harcourt Stakes at Trantham.