FROM STUD AND STABLE Clash Of Great Stayers Would Be Memorable

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32214, 5 February 1970, Page 4

FROM STUD AND STABLE Clash Of Great Stayers Would Be Memorable

Racing in this part of the world could offer no greater attraction at this time than a clash between Rain Lover and II Tempo at two miles.

Australia and New Zealand have simultaneously produced two of the greatest stayers in the world. They are only hours apart in travelling time, and it would be a matter for great disappointment if they were never to meet.

The A.J.C. will have one of the greatest racing attractions of the last 20 or 30 years if it can stage its 841,275 Sydney Cup at Randwick on March 30 with these two great stayers in the field.

Which of the two would be better at two miles? That was one of the subjects of strongest debate amongst Australians and New Zealanders after II Tempo's record-break-ing Wellington Cup win last month. Pedigree students lean towards Rain Lover, a grandson of the champion, Ribot, and a direct descendant of the English Oaks winner, Canterbury Pilgrim.

Genetic Freaks But to follow “the book" In forming such conclusions is to ignore those famous genetic freaks which supply much of the fascination and many of the brilliant success stories of racing. Fairway and Pharos were full brothers, but bore little physical resemblance to each other. And while Pharos could not stay beyond a mile and a quarter Fairway could win at twice that distance. As Sir Charles Leicester has explained: “When we arrange a mating we are taking a dip into the well of the ancestral factors of both parents. We know the ingredients in the wells, but we cannot accurately foretell which of these ingredients we will draw out’’

The mating of Night Raid with Entreaty produced the; incomparable Phar Lap. But lighting did not strike in the same place twice. Subsequent matings of Phar Lap’s parents also gave New Zealand racing some moderates and some outright failures. "Melba’s brother could not

sing the National Anthem.” That is one of the uncomplicated ways of answering those who are puzzled and irked by factors which upset what appeared to be the obvious. Sire Moderate It has been well publicised that II Tempo’s sire. Time and Again, was a moderate performer which won only three minor staying races on English courses during his career.

But it is also as well to remember that Time and Again is a full brother to Jan, winner of seven races after being

bought in England for Australia. One of Jan’s victories was in the A.J.C. Plate, of two miles and a quarter, and , she was second in both the Brisbane Cup and the A.J.C. Metropolitan Handicap. 11 Tempo’s dam, Timing, was a moderate performer but is a direct descendant of Eulogy, whose influence on . New Zealand and Australian racing has been immense. So it goes on, individuals of modest achievement but stemming from famous families, uniting to give New Zealand racing one of the staying phenomenons of the century.

When Rain Lover won his first Melbourne Cup in 1968 "The Press” said it almost seemed that the Adelaide stayer had an extra oxygen tank, so strongly was he going so far ahead of the others at the end of two miles.

It is exactly the same with Il Tempo. He is so much better at two miles than at any shorter distance. If the Wellington Cup had been run at two miles and a half, Il Tempo would have had the stamina and power to have won by a street. Not the least amazing feature of his run came after the race was all over. He was going at such a great rate that Noel Riordan had difficulty in pulling him up.

Could Rain Lover have done the same? Probably, if he was in the same form he produced to win his two Melbourne Cups, the second of them with 9.7 to 21b over weight-for-age on a blazing hot day at Flemington. Comparative times should not loom large in any arguments about the merits of these two great stayers. Trentham, in January, offers faster footing than any other of the major racecourses in this part of the world. It is futile to draw a comparison between it and a spring track in Melbourne, a city noted for its quick' changes of temperature and J weather at that time of the! year.

It is to be hoped that the arguments need not continue for any longer than the end of March, and will be settled in the Sydney Cup on Easter Monday.