RACING NOTES

Evening Star, Issue 21631, 29 January 1934, Page 5

RACING NOTES

[By St. Claie.]

RACING. January 51.—Tapanui R.C. February 1, 3.—Egmont R.C. February 3.—Poverty Bay T.C. February 3.—Matamata R.C. February 8, 10.—Dunedin J.C. February 8, 10.—Poverty Bay T.C. February 8, 10.—Taranaki J.C. LIVERPOOL GRAND NATIONAL,. At one period hopes were entertained that an Australian-bred horse might some day, not far distant, win the Liverpool Grand National, but lately nothing has been heard about the matter. Over sixty years ago an Australian-bred gelding named Dutchman was transported to England with a view to contesting the Grand National, but, as ho was on the disqualified list in Australia, his entry could not be entertained. At a subsequent period in the ’seventies Mr A. S. Chirnside sent Sailor, a really good horse, with several others, to England, but they failed to reward him for his plucky venture. When Daimio was sent to England in 1895 hopes ran high in Australia, for he had won the Victoria Grand National Steeplechase in two successive years. The change from Australia to England found a weak spot in Daimio, who was reshipped to the land of his birth. In 1913 Leah Kleshna won Grand National honours at Flemington, and her Owner, Mr W. Hill, had some thoughts of sending , her to England to race at Liverpool, but the trip did not eventuate. Bullawara. who was transported to England in 1914, contested the Grand National of 1915, but he failed to complete the course. A period of nineteen years has, therefore, elapsed since an Australian-bred steeplechaser was sent to England to -race in the Grand National. New Zealand-bred horses have contested the Grand National at Aihtree on two occasions. In 1903 Moifaa. a son of Natator, carried Mr Spencer Gollan’s colours to victory, and in 1900 Levanter, by Captivator, finished fourth. JOTTINGS. The first race at Tapanui on Wednesday is timed to start at noon. Acceptances for the_ first day of the Dunedin Cup. Meeting, and final payments for the Champion Stakes, are due at 5 p.m. on Friday. Meadow Lark looks none the worse for the hard race he had in the Waikouaiti Cup, and on Saturday morning strode out well in a gallop on the plough track,, which is again in good order. ■

The committee of the Dunedin Jockey Club will meet this week to decide on the _ system to be used on the totalisator at the Cup Meeting. After the success of the Forburu Park Meeting last week it looks as if the win and place system is likely to go out., Blue Mountain started four times at Forbury Park for a win and two seconds. This is a good record, and had he not been badly left in the fourth race would certainly have been in tho money, in that also, as he finished close up fifth. ' The Government was again the best winner over the Forbury Park Trotting Club’s Meeting. Stakes amounted to £3,000 and taxes totalling £2,925 15s 10a were paid as follows:—Totalisator £1,287 17s 2d, dividend £1,408 > ss, stakes £l5O, amusement £79 13s Bd. _ The seven top-weights in the Publican’s Handicap—Golden Wings 10.4, Autopay 9.9, Silver Ring 9.9, Croupier 9.8, Silver Streak 8.13, Great Star 8.2, and Cranford 7.lo—are all visitors from the north, and the handicap shows how much superior they are to the locally and Southland-trained sprinters. Though Southland-trained horses only secured one win (Teviot Downs) and two. seconds: (Journey’s End) at Forbury Park, two Southland-bred horses in Blue Mountain (one win and two seconds) and Sunny Morn (two seconds and one third) kept the Southern province well in the limelight.

Until Gunmetal won the sixth race' at Forbury-Park on Saturday backers of first favourites had a bad day. Then Lilian Bond gave them another winning dividend in the next race, but Indianapolis let them down again in the last race, his dividend for third place returning them less than half of their original investment. .

Grand Finale ’ has made a good recovery from the trouble that prevented him taking part in the New Year meetings, and on Saturday morning he galloped well with Last Link. Grand Finale is to be tried out over a distance at Tapanui on Wednesday, and'has also been engaged in the middle-distance races at the Dunedin Cup Meeting. In all the four-year-old Silver Ring has started twenty-nine times for eight wins, three seconds, one third, and seventeen times unplaced. In stakes he has won'. £1,921. It was at Trentham two years ago that Silver Ring scored his maiden success in the Fitzherbert Handicap. Mbrena is suffering at the hands of the handicapper more from his reputation than, his recent form. An Invercargill on January 2 Morena had 11.8 and Don Jose 11.7, the latter finishing in front, though both were unplaced. Don Jose did not start on the second day and Morena finished last. There is still the same difference between them in tho Warrington Hurdles to be run on the first day of the Cup Meeting. \ . Melbourne advices are to the effect that the New Zealand rider J. Barry has definitely decided to settle there. He has been joined by his wife, and will live at Mentone, the seaside .suburb where J. Holt, Len. Robertson, and other prominent trainers have their establishments. .Barry won a race at Pakenham, near Melbourne, just before the last mail left.

An English owner in the Duke of Westminster is going ih for racing in France on a fairly large scale. He now has a dozen horses with C. Halsey at Chantilly, and in addition to having secured nominations to French stallions for this year and next is sending several mares from England to France to foal, in order that their produce may be eligible for classics in the latter country. Lord Derby’s ex-trainer, the Hon. G. Lambton, is hiving no difficulty in finding patrons. One is the wealthy South ■American, Senor S. J. Unzue, whose horses were previously in'the care of C. Leader, now Lord Derby’s trainer. Lambton, who will continue to train for Lord Durham, has bought the Kremlin House stable at Newmarket. Recently Kremlin House has been occupied by G. Barling, who shares the stabling with Walter Earl.

The Auckland jockey A. G. Parsons will not readily, forget his unlucky decision to change his mount in the Kawa Knwa Cun at the Bay of Islands Meeting last Saturday. After accepting an engagement to ride Whakapara, Parsons decided to have the leg-up on Flying Prince, and after the Judicial Committee had considered the position Parsons was allowed to have his way at the cost of two guineas. To add to his misfortune Whakapara, ridden by S. J. Cammick, won the Cup decisively, with Flying Prince finishing at the other end of the field.

February 9, 10.—Marlborough R.C. February 19, 12.—Rotorua K.C.

TROTTING. February 3.—N.Z. Metropolitan T.C, February 17, 21.—Auckland T.C. February 24.—Now Brighton T.C. March 2, 3.—lnvercargill T.C. March 3.—Wellington T.C. March 10.—Timaru T.C.

Night Jester, who won -the January Hurdle Race at the West Australian Turf Club’s Meeting at Perth on January 13, is a seven-year-old gelding by Night Raid from Killalea, by _ Kilbroney. At the same meeting Agriflora, by Agricou, won the Torbay Handicap, which was restricted to horses bred in Western Australia. Remarkable scenes were witnessed in Adelaide on January 13, when off-the-course betting was permitted under the new law in the basement of Tattersall’s Chambers, adjoining Tattersall’s Club. Accommodation was totally inadequate for the thousands who sought admittance, and many who managed; to enter* the basement failed to reach one of jbhe twenty bookmakers who operated. Throughout the afternoon the room contained a mass of struggling people. The shade temperature was 93deg, and conditions in the building were almost unendurable. A long queue formed in the street an hour before the first ■ race. There was no meeting in South Australia, and the betting was oja the Epsom (Melbourne) races. ' . Purchased for 40gs as a yearling by Mr P. F. Campbell, Davolo has turned out a great bargain.’ 'His Douro Cup success put him out of the hack class,, and his total stake earnings are £602 10s. Davolo has made rapid progress, as he won his first race only last September at Geraldine, and the Douro Cup was his sixth win. With luck he may have added another on Wednesday, though it is doubtful about him heating Lone Raider. 1 At' any rate, Davolo is well fitted to make a start in open company. Last January Mr Campbell secured Davolo’s . brother -at the sales for 25gs. In the light of the 850 gs paid by Mr E. J. Watt on Tuesday For the three-quarter brother, Mr Campbell secured real bargains. The following shows how the stakes were distributed in connection with the Forhury Park Trotting Club’s Meeting:—C. S. Donald £4lO, Mrs I. E. Sweetapple £290, 6. Stanley £270, C. P. Cameron £l6O, R. B. Berry £l4O, M. J. Moodabe £l3O, Mrs E. A.-Rob-son £125, E. Mitchell £l2O, F. Loffhagen £l2O. T. and W. B. M'Cone £l2O, F. E. Sutton £llO. Mrs E. Berryman £llO, H. G. Lynch £lO5, J. S. Wilson £IOO, F. J. Smith £IOO, W. A. Howell ,£IOO, Mrs G. H. O’Connell £77 10s,' O. E. Hooper £67 10s, D. Teahen £65, J. Moore £SO, W. Norman £4O, J. B. Westerman £3(F. Roberts £3O, P. M'Kendry £3O, A. Quigley £2O, Mrs M.. Harrall £2O, G. J. Barton £2O, J. F. M'Kendry £2O, O. Smith £lO, W. Robinson £lO; — total, £3,000. • ' 1 When The Rector beat Rational H. and Rasouli in the Avenal Hurdles on the opening-day of the. Southland Racing Club’s Meeting, he carried 9.0, and the other two 10.12 and 9.11 respectively. On the second day The Rector (third) had 9.9, Rasouli (second) 9-12, and Rational 11. (sixth) 11.2. Since then' The Rector has won a steeplechase of • two and a-quarter miles, showing that, he can stay, and he meets fiasouli on 11b better terms, and Rational 11. on only 41b' Jdrse terms for beating him twice. The Rector also meets Morena on only 31b worse terms than when they, met > oh the last day of the Southland Meeting. The Southland horse , appears to bo particularly well treated in the Warrington Hurdles. The contest for the Gore Handicap was the most unsatisfactory from a racing point of view at Forhury Park. Real Huon and Tangatu, who deadheated in front of Gunmetal on the first day conceded the : last named 60yds, equal to ssec in the Gore Handicap, and though both went away well had lost 3seo on tbeir handicap at the end of six- furlongs. At the commencement of the last half mile they had run up to within, striking distance of the leaders, but then began to drift' again. The -first mile was run by Black Jester, who, acted, as pacemaker for . Gunmetal, in ' 2min 16 2-ssec, and the last mile took 2min 19sec. Had Margaret Chenault not put in a bad break at the end of seven furlongs she would have given the winner a lot of troble.

Reviewing the sprinters that took part at the Wellington Cup Meeting •‘The Watcher” says: On all three days the class was top line represented by Silver Ring; Silver Streak, Diatomqus, Autopay, and Golden Wings. The sprinting talent has never been better, and for once the light-weights, who usually bob up at Trentham, suffered an almost conmplete eclipse. Copyist pearly maintained their record, but he was not quite good enough. Golden Wings and Autopay are stiff our leading sprinters, but they found it impossible toehold their own at -the weights with the younger horses Silver Ring and Diatomous. Silver Streak upheld his fine record, and was not disgraced by defeat on Wednesday. He is a hardy gelding, but even his constitution found • three hard races too much. The times, 1.9|, I.IIJ (on a softer track), and I.IOJ, indicate that none but the best class could get any money. New Zealand is a country in which the totalisator has done wonders for country racing. Since the war the sport has been handicapped by taxation that has become extortionate, and it has been further burdened by the effects of the depression. have naturally fallen with the decline in revenue , suffered by the clubs, and that is why (says “Chiron’’) so many New Zealand horses have been coming to Australia to race in the last two or three years. Mr George Stead, who was by far the most successful owner New Zealand has known, used to bet very heavily in the days of his early .association with the turf. During the last twenty years of his life he seldom made a het. He raced on almost princely lines, as he maintained a large breeding as well as racing stud. He to!d“ Terlinga ” shortly before his death in 1908 that the totalisator was largely responsible for him giving up betting. “ Thanks to the totalisator,” he said, stakes are high enough in New Zealand to enable me to indulge my fancy for racing without betting. The three-year-olds, Red Manfred, Southdown, Spiral, and Epigram, who took on the older horses in the principal handicaps, performed below expectations at Trentham, and their failures do not make out a good case for three-year-old form (says “ The Watcher,” in the ‘ Dominion ’). Red Manfred apparently likes' a race run to suit him. Southdown has never recovered from his New Zealand Cup race, but the advance of the season may see him come back; Why he should have been such a warm favourite on Wednesday was a mystery. Spiral’s third in the Wellington Cup was more in keeping with his capabilities, but he finished near the tail of the field in the Racing Club Handicap. Epigram had every chance in both his races. Pos-

sibly these three-year-olds t were feeling the effects of the racing they had at Auckland, but it was reasonable to expect horses of their age aiidperformiiiica to do better,; -