EPSOM RACES

Otago Witness, Issue 2509, 16 April 1902, Page 48

EPSOM RACES

Much-needed ram in this State started to fall | in earnest on March 26. It was good for the | country, but bad for the Epsom racecourse pro- | prietary, as they brought off a meeting on that j day. Under ordinary circumstances the meeting would have been postponed, but with co many meetings ahead and Good Friday intervening, there appeared no chance of bringing it off for some time, so the club went through with the contract, wet and all. Fields were, naturally small and sport tame. Mr Barney Allen won races with two of the horses he intends to take to South Africa— The Idler 8.9, by Far Niente, winning the Welter Handicap, six furlongs, with odds of 7 to 2 on him, and the recently-acquired Bill of Portland filly Cretonne 8.10 the Mordialloc Handicap, one mile, going out at evens. Cretonne is only a pony, but she carried her weight home in the mud right gallantly. S. G. Thomas, who has not done much good m the saddle of late, rode both winners, and he was also on the back of Viceroy 8.2, by Me\al, who took the Trial Handicap, six furloilga. The Abbess 8.9 (by Bill of Portland), the favourite for the latter event, ran second, aild subsequently came out and, with only 7.2 to carry, put down the odds-on favourite Slatin 6.10 in the Epsom Handicap, five and a-half fxirlongs. Exchange 9.4, by the Melbourne Cup winner, Arsenal, took the Hurdle Race, and California 9.9, by Metal, the Jumpers' Flat Race.