FROM STUD AND STABLE N.Z. Produces Yearlings To Equal Best Overseas

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32232, 26 February 1970, Page 4

FROM STUD AND STABLE N.Z. Produces Yearlings To Equal Best Overseas

Lieutenant-Colonel Frank Beale, a director of the British Bloodstock Agency, Ltd, left New. Zealand yesterday with highly-favourable impres* sions of the present state of the bloodstock industry here.

Lieutenant - Colonel Beale last visited New ' Zealand six years ago, < and on his present trip i he has seen nothing to 1 alter his earlier impres- ’ sion that New Zealand , produces yearlings '■ which for substance, * good bone, conforma- , tion. and quality would < more than match those 1 raised anywhere else. ’ “At the stage where they s are offered at the yearling * sales your young horses are j right in the top class,” Lieu- s tenant-Colonel Beale said yes- 1 terday. s “What happens after that is a question of individual abil- i tty and those qualities that i make some racehorses good r and many others not so good. 1 “If money was the only I thing that mattered in getting I hold of champions from the 1 sale ring Bunker Hunt and c men like him would leave no good horses for anyone else.” c Optimist Lieutenant-Colonel Beale t tells the story of a wealthy 1 European who decided to go t into racing in a big way, set : up a trainer with a stable full c of horses, and told that I trainer that he would not in- s sist on a Derby winner in the t first year. I

Then there was another >wner like Sir Victor Sasson vho spent years and a forune trying to secure a Derby vinner. Then when his luck hanged for the better in the treat classic he found that me of his winners. Hard Ridlen, had cost something like !40gns. “He might have fought the colt for 180gns if le had not been bidding igainst his trainer on the ither side of the ring,” Lieu-enant-Colonel Beale said yeserday. He feels that racing ownerhip is rather like playing the one-armed bandit” Some flayers meet with immediate uccess: others have tried lard and long and never trike the jackpot. Lieutenant-Colonel Beale ras impressed by the pronotion and staging of the Initation Stakes at Te Rapa ast week, and hopes that the Inglish champion, Lester ’iggott, and one of the top Tench riders can be brought ut next year. He said he would have welomed a chance to see a little wre of the horses in the Waiato race with their riders up dore the race. “It’s a minor oint, I know, but I thought hese horses were whisked way all too quickly to a part f the course where few >eople who like horses as uch could get a look at hem.

“As 1 say, it is a matter of

no great consequence. Go to Aqueduct in New York, and the hardest place to find is the birdcage. I’ve been shown over the whole place from the crow’s nest for photographers to the basement, which even has its mortuary,' but there is little opportunity for the man who likes to have a look at the horses beforehand.” Stud Visits On his present trip he has inspected many New Zealand studs and many horses his firm has sent here in the last few years. One of his first calls was made at Ra Ora to ispect the successful sire, Sovereign Edition. The victory of Far Time in record time in the Waikato invitation race gave him special pleasure because the successful sire, Crest of the Wave, was secured by his firm for the Waikato studmaster, Mr lan Duncan. South Island-based stallions have also been on the books of Lieutenant-Colonel Beale's

firm, end his first call bn arrival in Mosgiel on Tuesday morning was to inspect Mellay at Mr B. J. Anderton's White Robe Lodge. Later in the day he saw Mellay's brilliant daughter, Lady Mellay, easily win the race for two-year-olds at the Dunedin Jockey Club’s meeting. Lieutenant-Colonel Beale has been accompanied on his visits to South Island studs by Mr D. B. Clarkson, bloodstock manager of Pyne, Gould, Guinness Ltd. Yesterday they inspected studs in Canterbury. Before returning to England he will spend some weeks visiting studs and attending sales in Australia. “The hospitality has been overwhelming, and at times I have felt that I would like a few minutes to come up for air, but I regret that I did not come soon enough to see your record sale at Trentham In January,” he said.

His last Australian engagement will be to attend the Sydney yearling saleai at Easter.