Las Vegas a problem horse

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33413, 20 December 1973, Page 8

Las Vegas a problem horse

The Yaldhurst trainer, B. H. Lynskey, could be forgiven for completely despairing a year or two ago of ever racing Las Vegas.

A bad fall in a race trial at Addington which left ugly scars on his knees, a mystery weakness in his legs that veterinary surgeons could not account for, and then frequent eliminations from race meetings nearly ended Las Vegas’s racing career before it started.

“Sometimes I thought I was just wasting my time with him,” said Lynskey during the week. Yet he pressed on, hoping that one day his perseverance and faith in the horse’s ability would pay off.

And they have. For last Saturday, at Rangiora, Las Vegas very easily won his second race from only four starts, which, for an' eight-year-old, is not bad going. FIRST WIN He won his first start at Oamaru in October, two starts later he ran a fine third at Waimate, and in view of this form he was at rather long odds when he paid more than $l6 to win

the A. C. Fraser Handicap during the week-end.

It would seem reasonable then for Lynskey to have an optimistic regard for the future of Las Vegas. Far from it.

“I have a good look at him every morning,” said Lynskey, implying that it would come as no surprise to him if he found the horse, for seemingly no reason, sore.

By Thurber Frost out of the Light Brigade mare, Los Angeles, Las Vegas has been in and out of work since he was about a three-year-old.

“He fell in a trial at his first start on Addington and hurt his knees so badly that the marks are still there.

“After that we thought a bone splinter might be causing him to go sore, but it never showed on an X-ray.

“I nearly gave up on him two or three times. We never knew where he was sore or what was causing it. But I knew he had ability,” said Lynskey.

FRUSTRATING The main frustration for trotting trainers is being balloted out, and Lynskey and Las Vegas were “regulars.” Lynskey estimates

(that Las Vegas was eliminated seven or eight times over the last year. However, at the Oamaru Trotting Club's meeting on Labour Day, Las Vegas received a start —after being balloted out on the first day of the meeting. He duly won, narrowly though, and since then has made pleasing progress.

Lynskey plans to race Las Vegas at Ashburton on Boxing Day, but because of the horse’s history, realises the futility of looking very far ahead.

The, family to which Las Vegas belongs is one which Lynskey has “dabbled” with for the best part of 25 years. His first horse was Santa Anita, a Jack Potts mare he leased with the right of purchase, but she contracted strangles as a three-year-old and never raced. At the stud she left Crown Jewel, Argentine, Santa Amada, Sierra Madre, Los Angeles, Tobermory, Sacramento. Brenda Ray, and Santaiena, seven of them being winners, one of the remaining three had a deformed foot, and another never raced.

Lynskey is breeding from four of them—Santaiena,

which has been served by Local Light, Los Angeles, which has returned a positive test to Tarport Coulter, Sacramento, served by Bachelor Hanover, and a Bachelor Hanover mare out of Sierra Madre, which was sent to Out To Win.

Los Angeles, the dam of Las Vegas, won three races and was placed nine times for just on $2OOO. She has been a generous matron at the stud, too, and since 1961 has foaled every year. Among those she has left include Captain Frost, the winner of seven races and 59330, Palmdale, Thurber Light, a winner in Australia, and three by Garrison Hanover which are in work with Lynskey.