Relegation halted trainer’s notable record

Press, 14 March 1985, Page 32

Relegation halted trainer’s notable record

By

J. J. BOYLE

An inquiry room decision ended a noteworthy course record for the Gore trainer, Rex Cochrane, at the Waimate Racing Club’s meeting on Tuesday.

Cochrane was left without a winner on the programme after his stable runner, Walden Pond, which had finished first in the Harrison Handicap, was relegated to second behind Been Burgled. Since he took up training on his own account in the 19505, Cochrane has been the most consistent supporter of race meetings in the district where he was born, but he, like many others, must have been wondering on Tuesday if Waimate will be on his visiting list for much longer. It is doubtful if the Waimate Racing Club can survive many, if any more, such financial disasters — a course turnover falling short of $60,000 and a decrease of over $150,000 on T.A.B. turnover. The Waimate Racing Club shares the racecourse property with the Waimate Hunt, each club holding one permit. A third day was lost to the district with the decision of the Waimate Trotting Club last year to operate at Oamaru.

Those immediately concerned with the Waimate Racing Club’s future could argue that any move on its part to either Washdyke or Oamaru would be only a move to a district where galloping is also struggling. A Saturday date on its home course also seems unlikely to be the right medicine for an ailing patient. The few extra patrons the club might attract on a Saturday date would avail it nothing when weighed against a lower T.A.B. turnover. Saturdays or week days, transport costs for horses are still formidable, and clubs like Waimate are in no position to offer stakes attractive enough to justify those costly exercises. Whatever the future of racing in the Waimate district, the historians will be able to record, with thanks, the contributions of Coch-rane-trained runners on the home course. Cochrane continued training on his own account after the death of his father in July, 1957, and in March of

1958 he won the Waimate Cup with Demolish, and saddled other winners in Royal Reponse and Kinsimm. He returned for the Waimate Hunt meeting later that season to win with Spiloch. In all those years in between Cochrane-trained runners have assembled a long list of wins on the Waimate course. On the rare occasions when the stable did not land a winner at the Waimate Racing Club’s meeting it would restore the balance at the hunt meeting in July. However, more often than not, Cochrane-trained winners went into the records at each meeting. Cochrane’s most successful meetings on the course were at the cup meeting in 1976 when he won with Fiery Filou, Lady Hampton, Carn and Rapid Flight, in 1982 with Double d’Or, Silver Guard, My Friend Blue, and Eagless, and at the 1974 hunt meeting with Haste Ye Back, Whio, Shirley’s Last, and Ayrshire Prince.