SHORTER INTERVALS

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 6, 6 July 1935, Page 23

SHORTER INTERVALS

PROPOSED TROTTING RULE

At the annual meeting of the New Zealand Metropolitan Trotting Club this week, several members spoke in favour of a remit that will come before the New' Zealand Trotting Conference next week, advocating a compuisory x reduction in the interval' between races to 35 minutes, with the exception of one interval of 40 minutes. Mr. A. A. Penfold urged that the club's delegate should be instructed to support the remit. The chairman (Mr. F. E. Grahamv said that he had. discussed the remit with the president (Mr. J. H. Williams), who was in favour of the intervals being shortened, but he did not like to make it obligatory 911 all clubs. Mr. Alan Watson criticised the present method, which he claimed was out of date. He said it was ridiculous to keep horses on the course for twenty I minutes after they had been warmed up. He suggested that the horses, after doing their preliminary, should be allowed to be' brought back to the Enclosure, where they could be kept warm until it was time for them to go to the starting post. Mr. F. W. Johnston said that the horses deserved more consideration, and maintained that under the present system horses were kept out on the track irrespective of weather conditions for a considerable time.

The Hon. W. Hayward, M.L.C., pointed out that there were other aspects to be considered. The remit, he said, was framed on the right lines, but finance was a big consideration, and the idea of horses being on the track; twenty minutes before a race was to give the betting public every facility for viewing their fancy. Mr. Penfold's motion that the club delegate should support the remit was seconded by Mr. Matson and carried.