SPORTING Howe’s Northern Goal Will Be Auckland Cup

Greymouth Evening Star, 16 December 1947, Page 9

SPORTING Howe’s Northern Goal Will Be Auckland Cup

Howe will race next at the Auckland summer meeting, and present intentions are for him to contest the Auckland Cup on Boxing Day. z He will be accompanied north by Distinction, and they are to leave Trentham on Thursday. Distinction is engaged in the Christmas Handicap on the opening day of the fixture and will contest the Great Northern Guineas on the third day.

Howe has been weighted 8.3 m the Auckland Cup, compared with the 8.0 he was allotted in the New Zealand Cup, in which the weights were framed on a 41bs lower scale. Howe contested the Riccarton Handicap, nine furlongs, in preference to the Cup, and won decisively. He then won the Jockey Club Handicap, one mile, and finished second to Revolte in the Fendalton Handicap, one niile and a quarter, on the later days of the meeting. Howe has shown his best form up to •a mile and a quarter and it is questionable whether he will see out the two-mile journey. R. JMackie, who rode him at Riccarton, has been engaged to ride him at Ellerslie. Consistent Youngster One of the most consistent three-years-olds to have raced this season, Distinction, won the Hawke’s Bay Guineas earlier in the season. He then finished a close second in the Wellington Guineas and was narrowly beaten by Liebestraum in the Derby. On the later days of the Canterbury meeting he finished third to Beau le Havre and Soneri in the Churchill Stakes, and beat all but Renowned, his stablemate, in the Stonyhurst Handicap. Neither Howe nor Distinction working at Trentham looked any the Worse for their Riccarton exertions. Royal Tan, who must be one of the

Auckland Cup favourites after his solid second to Beau le Havre in tpe New Zealand Cup, did not race upJo expectations in the Fendalton Handl* cap on the final day of the Riccarton meeting. However, he was not favoured with the best of the running, and he was going all right at the finish about three lengths behind the winner. Royal Tan is a stayer, and the distance of the Fendalton Handicap, one mile and a quarter, was a little short for him. Signal Officer and Royal Tan meet on the same terms at Auckland as they did in the New Zealand Cup, but on a 41b higher scale. As Signal Officer has won both the Metropolitan Handicap and Canterbury Cup' since they last met the figures are a good deal in his favour. Few horses have been working more attractively at Te Rapa in recent weeks than Foxwyn. This genuine son of Foxbridge won the big Ellerslie event in 1944 as a four-year-old, and was a little unlucky not to have added last year’s Cup to his credit, as he came with a brilliant run to fail by a nose to overhaul the light-ly-weighted Sylis. In a recent workout Foxwyn ran six furlongs, wide out ,in 1.15 4-5, and after his useful fourth in the Avondale Challenge Stakes he is sure to have many friends for his Boxing Day engagement.