RACING Jockeys’ Strong Stakes Record

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30724, 13 April 1965, Page 5

RACING Jockeys’ Strong Stakes Record

The Canterbury Jockey Club’s Champagne Stakes has been a good race for the jockeys, A. J. Stokes and R. J. Skelton, in the last few years.

Stokes has ridden three of the last six winners of the two-year-old classic and Skelton has won the race twice in that time.

Captain’s Command will be R. J. Skelton’s Champagne Stakes mount at Riccarton next Monday. Stokes will have the ride on Dear Pal if the Trenthamtrained Wellesley Stakes winner is brought south. Dear Pal was a meritorious second to Kintyre in the two-year-old race on the second day of the Manawatu autumn meeting last month. Her Easter programme had not been settled at the week-end, but she could be the Champagne Stakes favourite if she is brought to Riccarton. Out Of Form Captain’s Command was taken to Trentham for the Wellington autumn meeting, but did not do well on the trip and raced below his best form. He was a winner at Riccarton at the last New Zealand Cup meeting, and could improve the strong record of the Wingatui-trained horses in major races this season in the Champagne Stakes. R. J. Skelton won the Champagne Stakes in 1963 on Boundless. Two years earlier he won on Burgos. Stokes’s three winners in the last six years have been Shipmate. Jan Beebe, and Cadiz. He also won in 1954, on Hush Money, the dam of last year’s winner, Shipmate. Won Last Year The Shakes-D. N. Hadfield combination, successful in the Great Easter Handicap a year ago, will be renewed in that race next Monday. Hadfield also won the Templeton Handicap on Mr A. R. Bussell’s Pictavia gelding on the second day of the meeting last year. Success has eluded Shakes in 10 starts this season, but he has placed form in his five-year-old racing this season, and the possibility of soft or at least easy tracks at Easter should make him a force against the open

sprinters, which do not look a strong lot. Morris Francis, a stronglyfinishing second to Cranbrook in the sprint at Ashburton last week, will be R. J. Skelton’s Great Easter Handicap mount.

W. D. Skelton will ride the Woodville-trained Royal Chase, and A. J. Stokes will be on Hushaway. The Invercargill-trained Lorastan will be ridden by the Riccarton apprentice, A. R. Swanson, in the George Adams Handicap. B. Collins’s Adams Handicap mount is the Wingatuitrained Calvados, which should take beating with 7-4 if he runs at all close to his best spring form when he won twice in open class and finished fourth in the New Zealand Cup. B. Stechmann, an apprentice in J. L. Barr's stable, may have his first race ride in the Great Easter Handicap if, as

expected, his licence to ride is approved this week. Stechmann has been offered the ride on Sura in the Great Easter.