First-Day Form Good Guide

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31323, 20 March 1967, Page 6

First-Day Form Good Guide

Final Orders and Golden Guy, both winners on a wet track on the first day of the Wellington meeting, won again on firm ground at Trentham on Saturday.

Final Orders was backed down to odds-on in the Eastbourne Handicap, and by winning this £lOOO mile race he kept his winning record intact through three starts for his Wellington breeder, Mr J. A. Higgs. Final Orders did not jkceleratc as quickly as most of his rivals and he had seven or eight ahead of him at the half-mile. But there was not much doubt what would win when W. D. Skelton took him forward outside the leading group on the home turn. He won handily by threequarters of a length from Day, which outfinished the second favourite, Jane Blithe. Golden Guy is also un-

beaten in his last three starts, and his win on Saturday took his earnings at the meeting to £1460. He has been a bargain for the Pukekohe owner-trainer, J. R. Townsend, who bought him for less than £lOO. Golden Guy, a plain-looking Hiawatha gelding, was close to the pace from the start and showed pluck to resist a solid challenge from Gold Fort close to the end. Fair Koral improved two or three positions from the home turn for third, just ahead of Abbey’s Son and the Riccar-ton-trained Running Scared, which made ground late on the outside after being in the tail-end group to the straight.