RACING Friar's Birthday In Form For Wingatui Win

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30632, 24 December 1964, Page 4

RACING Friar's Birthday In Form For Wingatui Win

Wingatui horses might dominate the finish of the Dunedin Jockey Club Handicap on their home track on Saturday. The claims of Friar’s Birthday, Calvados, and Woodcock lode strong for this 11-furlong race, the first leg of die T.A.B. double on the opening day of the Dunedin Cup meeting.

Friar’s Birthday and Woodcock won the middle distance races at the two-day Southland meeting last month.

R. J. Skelton rode them both and, doubtless, could have ridden either of them tomorrow.

The fact that he has plumped for Friar’s Birthday will almost surely swing strongest support towards Mr E. Young’s Cassock gelding, which is two years younger and will carry 51b less than Woodcock.

Won Last Year

Woodcock, which won this race last year under 7-0, will be ridden on Saturday by the Riccarton apprentice, J. Messent, who won the New Zealand Cup on Alaska last month.

Woodcock is equal topweight with Calvados. There are four on the 7-0 minimum and two more on 7-3, and more than one of these lightweights will be ridden by jockeys unable to ride at the carded weights. Calvados has been one of the more distinguished members of a talented group of Wingatui distance runners this season.

He won as a hack at the Grand National meeting and broke through for his first open class win at the first time of asking in the Ashburton Cup. Next time out he beat some good performers in the Dunedin Jockey Club’s Banfurly Handicap, but was relegated to fourth after an inquiry. A week later, over the same course and the same distance, he won the Grandstand Handicap easily with a withering stayer’s run. Then he was prepared for the New Zealand Cup, in which he finished fourth, a position he also filled a week later in the Metropolitan, won by Palisade. Friar’s Birthday’s Riccarton record was also two fourths. They were in the Riccarton and Fendalton Handicaps, less strenuous races than the ones Calvados contested, and he improved with each of them. This, the first CalvadosFriar’s Birthday clash of the season, will, in itself, command a lot of interest. Placed Form Golden Glen, a member of the powerful Winsloe team at Gore, is in form for a placed run at least He was third two lengths and a-quarter back in the race won by Friar’s Birthday at Invercargill. He will meet the Wingatul horse on 71b better

terms on Saturday, so it will not be surprising if he is first or thereabouts.

Canterbury representation will be left to Zinder, Brown Brocade, Valuate and St. Malo. Unless the ground is soft or heavy, Valuate and St. Malo will find it hard to measure up to this class. Zinder, on the other hand, does best on top of the ground, but his form this season has been well below his best Brown Brocade ran usefully for third in the Hororata Cup at her latest start Her form just beforehand was not up to much, but those prepared to rate her chance on her best form will be encouraged by her dose second to Calvados in the Ashburton Cup. Problem Horse

Llanmai and Champ, two brilliant gallopers making fresh starts for the season are two of the problem horses in the James Hazlett Gold Cup, the second leg of the Wingatui double. Two seasons ago, Llanmai started his sLx-year-old career with a brilliant win over

some talented sprinteirs in the Wellington Racing Club’s Shorts Handicap. In the early stages of his campaign last season, he beat some top milers in the C.J.C. Caltex Stakes at Riccarton and, though not at his best after injury later in the season, he was placed at weight-for-age in the Clifford Plate at Ellerslie.

Llanmai gave Magician 121 b and beat him by half a neck in the Caltex Stakes at Riccarton just over a yew ago. They will meet on the same terms though on a slightly higher scale on Saturday, and it might be found that the Riccarton horse is one of the top contendere from the lower half of the handicap. Magician might be preferred to Champ because he is seasoned by spring racing. His early racing held much promise, promise that has not been all fulfilled, but his best run is a powerful one and his second behind Ichtar, a horse in a tremendous patch of form, at Riccarton last month was of equal merit to many winning runs in the James Hazlett Gold Cup in the last 20 years or so. Recent Winner Royal Bid will be another form runner for Riccarton stables. He has won the Geraldine and Hororata Cups since he entered V. D. Clutterbuck’s stable. He is a powerful galloper but one easily put out of stride in dose-running fields, and his best is seen when he gets lots of racing room. A mile is probably a bit

short of his best distance, but the Wingatui mile is a testing one and it makes heavy demands in races run at a true pace.

Palisade, probably Otago’s best stayer now that Great Sensation has passed from the racing scene after a long reign, is a stablemate of Llanmai.

For sheer brilliance Llanmai would probably have a definite edge at this distance, but Palisade has won open class races from seven furlongs up, and is a brilliant type of stayer able to run close to the pace—just the type to come out on top against good milers on a roomy track. Royal Estate, the runnerup to Palisade in the C.J.C. Metropolitan; Bellarook, one of the most consistent sprinters at the same meeting; Explain, a good winner as a sprinter and middle distances last season; and Yankinville, one of the best sprinters produced in South Canterbury in the last few years, are all capable of solid runs at this distance.

Royal Estate was the best of the South Islanders in finishing third behind Ichtar and Baloo in the Riccarton Handicap, nine furlongs, on the first day of the New Zealand Cup meeting. That performance reads well in the light of the later performances of the two northerners, two of the stars of the C.J.C. meeting.

Fields, with form, for the T.A.B. double races are:—

1.45 p.m.— DUNEDIN JOCKEY CLUB HANDICAP, £825; Ilf. st. lb. 4144 Calvados (2) N • 8 0 401 Woodcock (6) 8 0 0000 Zlnder (10) .. 7 13 743 Golden Glen (12) .. 7 11 68 Panther (7) 7 10 2441 Friar’s Birthday (13) 7 9 0552 Andalusia (11) 7 8 2509 St. Malo (4) 7 3 7000 Valuate (3) 7 3 5803 Brown Brocade (8) 7 0 9096 Loraston (1) 7 0 Scratched: Mighty Son (9). Cassarook (5). 5JS p.m. JAMES HAZLETT COLD CUP £850; Im. st. b. 1260 Kumai (13) 9 3 Llanmai (7) 9 2 2331 Palisade (15) 1. . 9 2 1263 Bellarook (14) • 9 0 Champ (8) .. 8 7 0091 Royal Bld (9) 8 7 1352 Royal Estate (11) 8 5 0740 Silver Spire (4) - . 8 5 2608 Explain (1) 8 4 2026 Magician (5) 8 4 007 Yankinville (3) 8 3 8731 Beginner's Luck (6) 8 2 7683 Birthright (12) 8 2 260 Cheiro (10) 8 0 0890 Satinette (17) 8 0 2501 Startler (16) 8 0 4796 Tampa (2) .. 8 0 Bracket: Kumai and Llanmai.