SPORTING MISTAKES.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 5000, 25 January 1878, Page 2

SPORTING MISTAKES.

Sir, — Very often it is asked — what sort of a meeting will we have* in Hawke's Bay this season 1 The question can be very easily answered by looking over the ages and imposts of the different nags entered for the H.B. Handicap. Now that the weights are declared, I am confident interrogations may cease, and all interest in racing die out, when the shoulders of the interested are put to the wheel to debar outside horses from having the shadow of a show of competing. The weighting of Friday evening is an excellent sample of keep-the-inoney-amongst-us sort of handicap. Some years ago the same principles of exclusion were practised in Auckland. Mark the result ! Nominators became shy— acceptances few. Fields dwindled down to a mere handful, and walking over with the scrubbers was the order of the day at Epsom. A few years later the folly and loss of pursuing such a course was plainly visible ; and had a change not shortly taken place, racing would have ere this have been sunk in oblivion in the North. New men took the matter up. More liberal advances were made to colonial breeders. The handicapping was deemed satisfactory. Southern men got a fair show, and it was not long till such men as Messrs Redwood, Delamain, Nosworthy, and that famous old sportsman Mr (commonly called "Paddy") Stafford sported silk and satin in the Northern I capital ; and, lam happy to say, with fair success. Let us now look over the handicap which appeared on Friday, the 18th instant, and see where the handicapper displayed great ability or knowledge of racing matters in general when trying to bring big fields to Napier. I should like to know what the four-year old horse Danebury ever did that he should get the premier position in any ! forthcoming handicap. He scored a win in the Champion in Christchurch through an accident happening to his opponent Dead Heat. This cannot be called a great performance, as the beaten horse, Dead He ( at, was immediately after the race established first favorite for the next Derby. Danebury again raced in the I spring in Canterbury with very indifferent success ; afterwards going to Auckland in the summer, and getting a dressing by Ariel, Perfume, and a host of others of much less notoriety. It is hardly necessary for me to give a resume of the last Canterbury spring meeting. Daneb\iry started in several handicaps and a weight for age race, and was not able to live with even a medium class of animal. In the face of all this, Napier gives him 9st. 41b. and expects him to race against such, performers as Ngaro and Otupai, both five, year olds. In Havelock Handicap, Sybil a three-year old, carried 6st. 41b. , Ngaro 9st. 41b. The former won by half a length, and for doing so she gets 7st. in the Hawke's Bay Handicap, and the latter gets a drop to Bst. 71b. What, in the name of common reason, goes farther towards defeating that which all good sportsmen delight in — viz., a good field — than a bad handicap ? Hoping I have not taken up too much space in your valuable columns — I am, &c. , ' Dkone.