SPORTING NOTES.

Lyttelton Times, Volume LXXIV, Issue 9275, 2 December 1890, Page 2

SPORTING NOTES.

I* The following are the results of the Taratalii-Carterton races held on Nov. 18 : —Hurdle Ba.ce: Speculator 1, General Gordon 2, Chatterbox 3. Maiden Plate: Martinboro 1, Dolly 2, Alii 3, TaratahiCarterton Handicap : Brookfield f. Deception f, Waihora 3. Welter Handicap : General Gordon 1, - Speculator 2, Ahi 8. Plying Handicap: Charlie 1, Dolly 2, Deception 3. Clareville Handicap i General Gordon 1, Brookfield 2, Kahumingi {3. Forced Handicap: Martinboro 1, j Waihora 2, Ahi 3. There is nothing, succeeds like success, and Mr D. S. Wallace must ho pretty well weary of the encomiums that have been heaped upon his head since, in a moment of extravagance, he paid 3000 guineas for Carbine. However, here is a refreshing change. A correspondent writes to the Sydney Referee :—The persistency with which some owners overwork their horses is exciting a good deal of adverse comment, and notably in the case of D. S. Wallace, who runs his horses while they have a leg to stand on. It will be remembered that this gentleman sent the wonderful Carbine to compete for the Sydney Cup against fresh horses, including Meloa and Dreadnought, having himself run in a race an hour previously. The unfortunate animal had to do something similar at several meetings, such as starting for the All Aged Stakes and Loch Plate the same afternoon, winning both two years in succession. This was hard work, and unless Carbine was a phenomenal horse he would have broken down long ago. It is all very well to scoop in the baubees, but some consideration should be shown to the noble animal capable of such achievements. And now we find Megaphone threatened with similarly harsh treatment. He was started on Thursday for the Plying Stakes, which he had to race hard to win, and shortly afterwards was saddled up for the Eoyal Park Stakes, which, after a deperate finish, he won from Lady Carbine. When Megaphone was recently sold in Sydney, satisfaction was expressed that he got into good hands. I, however, thought it was a case of out of the fryingpan into the fire. One race one day should be the motto of all true sportsmen. There may be something in what this correspondent says, but it is only fair to point out that Carbine had not run in a race for forty-eight hours before his last successful effort in the Sydney Cup, while Melos was no fresher than the winner, and' Dreadnought did not start at all. Then it was in the Plying Stakes, not in the Eoyal Park Stakes.thafc Megaphone defeated Lady Carbine.

The cable brings the result of the Manchester November Handicap, the event which practically closes the flat racing at Home. This was won by Parlington, a colt by Highborn from Nancy Lee, that showed very moderate form last year; while Shall-we-Kemember, a filly from Musket’s daughter Sonsie Queen, was second, and the Australian Eingmaster third. Last year this race attracted a field of twenty-eight, and was won by Fallow Chat. The Wellington Eacing Club appears to have scored a distinct success with its Spring meeting, and it is pleasant to be able to congratulate Mr Lyons and his Committee upon the revival of sport in the Empire City. The weather was delightful, and the attendance, if not large, was a marked improvement upon the records of previous years. The Spy won both the Hurdle Eaces with the greatest ease, and the style in which he carried his 12st 111 b to victory on the second day establishes his claim to a place in the front rank of our jumpers. Boulanger won the principal race, the Hutt Park Handicap, on the first day, and secured the Petone Handicap on the second; hut in the former event he was receiving IGIb from Whisper and the rest of his opponents were only moderate. Cyniaca could not get a place in the Grand Stand Handicap on Friday, but she came out in better form next day and won the November Handicap from end to end. A full report o£ v the racing appears in another column.

Our recent race meeting, writes our Ashburton correspondent, was quite like a revival of the good old times, and while waiting for the second day’s handicaps we were entertained by some very amusing reminiscences cf local racing twenty years ago; “ It was somewhere about ’70,” said a well-to-do farmer who had made himself the centre of a group of loungers, “ that I saw a capital hurdle race down here. There were only two starters, and it took about half an hour to run; but, bless you, we had lota of fun. Bob Derrett., was up on a horse that belonged to Mr Middleton (I forget its name), and Willie Edwards rode the other —the slowest brute that ever started in a race. We did not keep count of the number of times they baulked, but we walked from one hurdle to another and saw all the show. Derrett’s mount was a bit of a galloper, but he didn’t know anything about jumping and his jockey couldn’t teach him much. He had a tremendous long neck and big ears, and Derrett seemed to take a very close interest in these points every time lie blundered over a fence. The last hurdle was only about a couple of hundred yards from the winning post and Derrett’s mount, which clouted it pretty hard, didn’t get much assistance at the finish, but, as a chap said to me at the time, ‘ with one spur in his eye and the other under his tail,’ he managed get home. 1 don’t think Derrett enjoyed it as much as we did. He had a strange, faraway look in his face when he got off, and they tell me ha hasn’t ridden in a hurdle race since. By jove, how we did laugh! It was the very next year, I think, that Dan O’Brien showed us what he could do with a bad un. It was a horse called lago, which no one else could get to jump over a rail on the ground, and his owner only entered him in the Hurdle Saco as a bit of a lark. I shall never forget that race. Dan didn’tmbuse his mount, and he didn’t pet him, but this lago was the rawest, awkwardeat brute you ever saw. First of.-all he tried to bolt, and then ' ha b i" tried to - run round the hurdles, and then he tried to stop, and when he was jambed through he tried to fall down. But it was no go ; he was nothing more than a child in Dan’s hands, and he had to win. I recollect an old fellow looking at the horse in the paddock after the race, and exclaiming to his mate, ‘ He’s a bad, a’k’ard beggar, Andy,’ and Andy was somewhere about the mark when he replied, e Aye, laddie, hut he had a man on his back.’ Yes, those were the good old days. We hadn’t any totalisator, and only a spring dray for a stand, and Cracroft Wilson used to judge on top of an empty gin case, but I’d give a tenner to see Derrett and O’Brien ride those races again. I don’t expect though Derrett would do it for half what he’s worth, and that’s no trifle.” There were plenty of other anecdotes of local sport which may amuse your readers at another time. “ Eapier,” writing in the Sporting and Dramatic News of the English and Australian systems of trying horses says:— The question is whether trials come out correctly oftener in England than in Australia, and that is a matter which cannot be ascertained. So far as I can make out, about the same proportion of favourites win in both hemispheres ; hut it does not follow that the horse which starts favourite has made the best time in the Colonies, for Colonial trainers know howto keep their secrets as well as their English brethren; though, by the way, if the tout has a good stop watch he can tell just as much as the trainer, whereas touts who watch English trials do not know what weights the horses are carrying, and when the animals meet at different weights the result is, of course, far more varying than it can bo when the time test is employed ; for I do not suppose it makes an appreciable difference to a horse’s speed whether he carries seven stone or eight, and the tout could see whether a little boy like Bradford or a man like Webb were in the saddle. As for time. Memoir ran the Oaks course in 2min 40*sec, by far the best time ever made ; Ormonde took 2miu 45-Jaec, The inference is that if Ormonde and Memoir had lived in the same year and met at Epsom, Memoir would have won by

as nearly as possible eighty yards; and this no one will believe. Of course, I foresee the reply to this. That in the Derby of Ormonde’s year and the Oaks of Memoir’s, neither was running against, time ; and this is so, but I think it is the] case that when the time test has been tried; in this country it has been found more! deceptive than putting horses together at ; well calculated weights, and having the trial ridden in the presence of- men who can judge what pace the horses are going, and what they are really doing.