RACING NEWS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23595, 3 September 1938, Page 22

RACING NEWS

By Sentinel

Good Order The Geraldine track is reported to be in excellent order for the annual race meeting.' Haereko The Nightmarch gelding Haereko was amongst the recent winners at Brisbane. Wild Talk Wild Talk developed signs of sameness after galloping with Keen Sight at Riccarton on Thursday. At Ashburton Nominations are due ori Monday for the Ashburton spring meeting and a payment is also due for the John Grigg «A New Owner It is reported that Mr E. Steele, the new proprietor of the Elderslie Stud, intends to race some horses in New Zealand. Trophies The Geraldine Cup, of £2lO, includes a trophy valued at £2O, and the President's Handicap, of £155, includes a trophy valued at £lO. Disdain The brilliant filly Disdain, according to present intentions, will not be raced again until the New Zealand Cup meeting.

Lady Leigh Lady Leigh, who won in good style at ,the Grand National meeting, has been kept going in order to be ready to race again at the early spring meetings. Glenvane

Glenvane, who won the Hunt Cup at New Plymouth, scored his first win in 1935, when racing as a six-year-oid. He was got by Weather vane from Glen Helen, by Treadmill. The Geraldine Meeting Nominations for the Geraldine Racing Club's meeting are due oh Monday next, September 5, at 8 p.m. The club has increased stakes and reduced acceptance fees and every race on the programme is worth £IOO or more to the winner. Amigo '^W : The Beau Pere gelding,'Amigo, who did so well as aivtwo-y earmold, did not make a goOd.start for'his second season by finishing out of a place in the Waihau Handicap,; for which he started favourite. As'a two-year-old Amigo won four .times, was second three times and third once in 10 starts. The Trump Frank Dempsey does not. bandy words about horses, nor does he make excessive use of superlatives when discussing them. We were chatting over the respective merits of horses • (says a Melbourne scribe), and The Trump was mentioned. "1 have seen and ridden numbers of good horses," Frank said. " I have also- ridden and seen some great ones. The Trump is one of the latter. The word good does not convey my opinion of the Cups winner." Lord Cavendish Lord Cavendish, who won at the combined hunt meeting, is the first of Beau Pere's stock to win as a three-year-old. He started four times as a two-year-old, and recorded a second and a third. Lord Cavendish was third in a maiden race at Otaki and second to Ruling Lady at Taranaki. His dam. Lady Cavendish, was got by Absurd from Bonny Portland, by Boniform—Helen Portland. Missed

A report of the second division of the Weraroa Stakes was missed from the results of the Combined Hunts' meeting. The result was as follows: SECOND DIVISION 2/I—ST. CEDRIC. 8.5 ... 1 1/2—EUROTAS, 8.5 . ..2 > 4/4—NARRATOR. 8.5 .. .. 3

Also started: 3/3 Car Leaf 8.5, 5/5 Misora 8.5, 7/7 Gold Tray 8.5, 6/6 Flying Hostess 8.5, 8/8 Danimai 8.5. Won by two and a-half lengths, five lengths between second and third. Car Leaf was fourth. Time, lmin 6 l-ssec. Nightguard Nightguard, who now seems to be quite sound, is coming into increased favour for the Caulfleld Cup, for which he is particularly well handicapped. He is a four-year-old, with 8.2, which is 121 b less than weight-for-age. As a two-year-old he was mixing it with Hua, Ajax, and Csesar. He won the Alma Stakes with 8.1, in which Csesar was second with 8.6 and Hua third with 8.0. He was third to Hua and Caesar in the Sires' Produce Stakes, which Hua won by half a head from Caesar, with Nightguard a head away. Ajax was unplaced. Csesar, Ajax, Hua, and Nightguard was the order at the end of the Ascotvale Stakes., In the A.J.C. Sires' Produce Stakes Nightguard was third to Ajax and Csesar, and third to Ajax and Hua in the Champagne Stakes. He was always there or thereabout with the cracks. Last spring Nightguard finished third in the Moonee Valley Gold Cup with 7.7 to Frill Prince and Mala. He led fiarly,. and then dropped behind the pacemaker, Navarino, but he was in front again approaching the straight entrance. Frill Prince and Mala wore him down in the straight, but he was less than a length behind Frill PrinCe, and lost second place to Mala by only a head. All going well with him in the interim (says the Australasian), Nightguard seems a possibility for the Caulfleld Cup with 8.2. Avenger will have some difficulty in conceding him 151 b over the Caulfleld Cup distance. A Suggestion If the motive which has actuated the V.A.T.C. Committee is to give Australian racing a boost by making its attractions better known abroad, excellent results probably would accrue from a visit of a notable English racing journalist. Many of them go abroad so as to miss the English winter, and there would be little difficulty in inducing at least one of them to come to Australia and take in the racing in Melbourne and Sydney during the Christmas holidays. If the V.A.T.C. feels disposed to repeat the invitation to a distinguished racing personage in England a leading English turf writer might be considered. The success of Gordon Richards has been phenomenal. Last season he headed the list of English winning jockeys for the seventh year in succession and for the eleventh time in 13 years. This year he is so far ahead of his rivals that there is no possibility of him being deprived of his place at the head of the list, so this will make his eighth successive jockeys' championship. Jones, who is likely to accompany Richards, is a fine horseman, but is handicapped by his weight, which is about 8.8. He won 46 races last season from 413 mounts. He does most of the * best riding for the famous Manton stable, as he has retainers from Lord Astor and Lord Portal.

.Australians will look forward to seeing in action one of the greatest English jockeys of recent times. There is a great difference in the styles of English and Australian jockeys, just as there is between the riding methods of English and American jockeys, as Donoghue explains in his recent book, "Donoghue Up." The difference is due to the nature of the courses. There are circular courses in England as there are in Australia, but the majority of them have long straight stretches and long straights, and they call for riding methods different from those employed on the comparatively small circular tracks in use in America and Australia. Victorians have been made familiar with the English style of riding by F. Herbert, who was riding, in Melbourne during the war period, and in more recent times by Frank Dempsey, who rides with the long rein, which is characteristic of English jockeys, including Richards, Frank Bullock was another typical exponent of the English style of riding, although he graduated in Australia. He made frecment visits to Australia, and rode with success. So, even if Richards accepts the V.A.T.C. invitation and rides here, he will not show Australian jockeys anything new in the matter of style. N?arco

Mr Martin Benson's latest addition to his Beechwood House stud, Newmarket, England, is the unbeaten Italian-bred colt Nearco, who was bought for £60,000, and was immediately retired from training to take up stud duties So keen were breeders to secure bookings to the son of Pharos that his list filled quickly at 400 guineas for the 1939 and 1940 season. Mr Meyrick Good, one of the most competent English authorities on the thoroughbred, who writes for the London Sporting Life, describes Nearco. whom he was invited to inspect by Mr Benson, in that publication "Nearco." he writes, " is more of a bay than a brown, lighter in colour, but very much like his sire, who was a strong horse with very powerful quarters. When he lets down after a year or two at the stud, I can visualise him as one of the best looking stallions in the land. I can see in Nearco many of Pharos's finest attributes. He has not the same width of hip, but he has his sire's grand iron-like limbs and tendons. When seeing him in his box T was not altogether surprised that opinions had been expressed that he was only a medium-sized horse, but when I stood alongside him I realised that he was over 16 hands There is no surer test of goodness than that a horse should look smaller than he really is. It is certain proof of correct balance and symmetry. He is more like his progenitor in front than behind the saddle He is higher at the withers, hence his deceptiveness in height. His withers run so far back that there is little behind him when saddled up." Nearco's head cannot be faulted, according to Meyrick Good " It is lean and bloodlike, with an intelligent eye, but as gentle as a woman's. Although his muzzle is smalls denoting quality, his nostrils are big enough and his ears good. His muscular neck is neither too heavy nor too light, while his oblique and perfectly-placed shoulder and length from hip to hock show where his great galloping powers come from, What I think about him above all his other fine points are his magnificently sprung ribs, the hoops going well back. He has the correct straight dropped hocks, and I have never seen better feet on a horse. It is no detriment that he is higher in the wither than the croop, not that he has a swish tail, and when you stand behind him you see that he has enough width

across the hips, which droop more than did those of Pharos. In fact, better iudges that I have seen Nearco," concluded Meyrick Good, " and they have found it a very difficult matter to find the least flaw in his make-up."