The Manawatu Racing Club's Programme.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLI, Issue 8053, 3 April 1905, Page 5

The Manawatu Racing Club's Programme.

(To the Editor)

'Sir,—-To anyone haying experience of racing in the colonies a perusal of the above programme provokes no small degree of surprise. Out of the six fiat races provided for each day's racing four are for distances of seven furlongs and under, and on the second day two of these are for five furlongs only, but, what thrilled me most with .astonishment was to find that the big money, £500 (more than double the amount fixed for any other event) is allotted to a three-quarter mile flutter. By carrying out a policy such as disclosed above, all that we regard as the.higher qualities in blood-stock such as stamina, high courage, great endurance and well-sustained swiftness are set at nought in favour of a breed of sprinters, and the stock argument in" support of racing, i.e., that it encourages people to improve the breed of horses, no longer carries weight. I don't think, however, that there is much danger of the leading clubs in Australia or New Zealand following in the above lines, composed as they mostly are of men of wide experience and sound judgment in all that pertains to the interests of the turf. That a certain number of short distance races should find a" place in all racing programmes I admit, but that they should monopolize the greater number of events or the greater amount of added money would,' I maintain, prove destructive to the best interests of racing. Looking ait it from another point of view it is not such satisfactory racing as in longer distances. It often happens that the element of chance has a good deal to do in determining the winner. To get away with a good lead is everything and in large fields with the scramble for a leading position it may often happen that the besthorse is blocked or shut out. This, every racing man must know, is far more likely, to occur than in long distance events.

With the great possibilities in the future of the Club I trust that in formulatmg their future programmes they will extend greater encouragement te firstclass racing.—I am, etc., '

Scrutator, Palmerston, Ist April, 1905..