Triton fourth

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32958, 3 July 1972, Page 8

Triton fourth

(N.Z. Press Association) BRISBANE. The Brisbane jockey, L. Olsen, rider of the New Zealand sprinter. Triton, returned to scale an angry man after his mount had to settle for fourth in the $40,000 Doomben Ten Thousand (7f.) on Saturday. He waved his arms in the birdcage in agitation and had plenty to say about rival jockeys causing him trouble throughout the race. He talked at length with Triton’s trainer, S. A. Brown, but no official protest was made. Immediately after weigh-in. however, the stewards declared they would hold an inquiry into certain infringements they had noted from the half-mile. No action was taken by the stewards, but in their report they said Triton, making a forward move near the furlong, had to be checked off Amberdue’s heels, when Amberdue drifted out slightly under pressure.

There was little doubt that Triton’s chance was affected by i the incident, but Olsen was the first to admit that Triton would have had little hope of getting to the winner, Bengalla Lad. The three-year-old Bengalla Lad cleared right away in the final half-furlong to win in racerecord time by three lengths and ,a quarter from Charlton Boy. with Amberdue a long neck away third.

The time for the race was 1:18.1.

Triton returned to scale with a cut on his off foreleg as a legacy of the roughly-run race, but Brown like Olsen, said after the race, thta under no circumstances did Triton look like beating Bengalla Lad.

Triton was slow to jump and had to settle in the middle of the field on the rails. He weaved his way into fifth place at the turn, where Bengalla Lad got a rails run when Zambari drifted out. Triton looked to be hampered for a run at that stage, but Bengalla Lad had skipped well clear and nothing looked like catching him in the run down the straight. The only New Zealand-bred winner on the nine-race Doomben card was the Melbourne visitor, Kurdi Mahal (Kurdistan — Fickle Jade), which scored at odds of 80/1 in the seven-furlong Smoke Welter Handicap.