SPORTING.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 6007, 25 November 1890, Page 2

SPORTING.

The stakes at tho V.R.C. meeting totalled £27,916. Mr. D. S. Wallace's cheque amounted to £11,911, Mr. S. G. Cook came second with £2048 (tbe Admiral's win in the Derby being responsible for £1359), Mr. E. E. A. Oatloy was third with £2000 (for Highboru's second in tho Melbourne Cup), the Maribyrnong Plate was worth £1460, the Oaks £805, and the Steeplechase £688.

Mr Alfred Watson, son of the famous V.R.O. starter, has died from his horse rolling over him in a steeplechase at Moonee Valley. He was a splendid rough and cross-country rider, a notabio , amateur boxer, aud one of tho renowned band of athletes who loaded the s.s. Monowai during the strike. -The father could not start on the last day of the V.R.C. meeting, owing to his son's death. The old man is the prince of starters. He does not always get his horses away in perfect line, but the public forgive him an occ .sionul lapse (such as in the Maribyrnong Pluto this year) for his average excellence. His'.sp3oial good quality is keeping entire cor.jtm-.nd of the jockeys and preventing ail false starts. He rarely takes fivo minutes to get the biggest field away. There is no such thing as a horse galloping half-way round arid the others fractiously waiting till ho is brought back. It is a rare chance fur a horse to break away more than 50 yards. Hia son, Tom Watson, who start, at Rand wick, is nearly as cool and as decided as hia father.