RACING Lady Mellay fancied in Oamaru sprint today

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33492, 25 March 1974, Page 8

RACING Lady Mellay fancied in Oamaru sprint today

The outcome of the Glenmorven Easter Trial at Oamaru today could have a bearing on the Great Easter Handicap at Riccarton next month.

Five of the nine acceptors in the Oamaru Jockey Club’s 1400 m event are among the entries for the Canterbury Jockey Club’s big sprint on Easter Monday.

Notable among them are Lady Mellay, Annenic, and Strad. which are generally expected to battle it out for honours today.

A victory for Lady Mellay would be thoroughly deserved. Only once in eight starts since she beat the open sprinters at Invercargill in January has this consistent Wingatui-trained mare failed to weigh-in.

Although Lady Mellay’s lone win this season was at 1200 m she has proved very capable up to 1600 m—one of

her three victories last season was over the latter distance in the Oamaru Winter Cup—and today she will be tackling 1400 m. Annenic and Strad also have winning runs close up ion their records. The former i was successful over 1200 m on : her .home course at WingaItui last month and showed that she has held her form well with a third behind His Bestone and Surge Again at Ashburton last Wednesday. Strad has won three open sprints this season. The first, at Orari in September, was ’over 1200 m, and the other i two were both 1400 m events

at Omoto. Another first-class run close up on his record was his second, beaten by a nose by Shifnal King, in the Craven Plate at Riccarton last month. First leg The other race for openclass horses on today’s programme will be the Squires Gin Handicap in which the top fancies, now that Brown Satin has dropped out of the field, will almost certainly be Magic Touch, Haste Ye Back, Rebel Lad, and Royal Rhyme. The Squires Gin Handicap will be the first leg of the

T.A.B. concession double. The second leg of the double will be the De Geest Bros Sixteen Hundred which has attracted a capacity field of class three and four metric milers. The Invercargilltrained War Ace, which will be going for his fourth win from his last five starts, will probably be a firm favourite.