RACING & TROTTING

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19329, 2 November 1932, Page 5

RACING & TROTTING

On And Off The Track

A BUDGET OF NEWS AND VIEWS FIXTURES. Racing: Nov. 5, 7—Auckland R.C. Nov. 5,7, 9, 12 —Canterbury J.C. Nov. 10, 12 —Whangarei R.C. Nov. 12—Hawke's Bay J.C. Nov. 16—Dannevirke R.C. Nov. 18, 19—Winton J.C. Nov. 19, 21—Waikato R.C. Nov. 26—Levin R.C. Nov. 26, 28—Takapuna J.C. Nov. 30, Dec. I—Feildingl—Feilding J.C. Dec. 1, 3—Dargaville R.C. Dec. 3—Ashburton County R.C. Dec. 7, B—Woodville District J.C. Dec. 9, 10 —Taumarunui R.C. Dec. 17 —Waipa R.C. Dec. 26 —Waipukurau J.C. Dec. 26, 27—Westland R.C. Dec. 26, 27—Taranaki J.C. Dec. 26, 27—Dunedin J.C. Trotting: Nov. 8. 10. 11—N.Z. Metropolitan T.C. Nov. 19—Northland T.C. Nov. 24, 26—Forbury Park T.C. Dec. 3 —Waikato T.C. Dec. 10—New Brighton T.C. Dec. 26—Ashburton T.C. Dec. 26—Gore T.C. Dec. 26—South Wairarapa T.C. Dec. 26, 27—Westport T.C. Dec. 27, 29. 31—Auckland T.C. Dec. 29—Winton T.C. Dec. 30 —Reefton T.C.

New Zealand Cup on Saturday. Trotting Cup on Tuesday. The New Zealand Derby will be run on Monday. It is understood that there will be a small deficit on the Geraldine Racing Club’s meeting held in September. The A.J.C. Derby winner Peter Pan, was not nominated for the V.R.C. Derby. On Top, who raced in Canterbury for one season, is now being trained for hurdle racing by H. Gray. Pillow Fight was not nominated for the New Zealand Derby, but is in the Great Northern Derby, to be run at New Year. The northern light-weight horseman, W. H. Jones, who has decided to take up residence in Timaru, will ride Red Racer in the New Zealand Cup. The cancellation of the Banks Peninsula meeting two days before it was due to be held, suggests that the Club was not over keen to race.

Waimate is represented in the big events of Carnival Week—Roi lOr in the Trotting Cup, Silver Streak in the Derby, and Mount Boa in the Stewards. Despite the unsettled weather, the Oamaru Trotting Club will be able to show* a credit balance on its Labour Day meeting. The Club has the unique record of never having sustained a loss on any of its fixtures. Gay Crest was third in last year’s Cup with 8.10, and has 9.5 in a stronger field this year. He has improved in the interval, but another 91b about the 9.0 mark is a big rise, and will probably stop him. After their return to Invercargill from the Gore meeting, The Smuggler and Signaller were turned out together in an enclosure, and the former was rather badly kicked about the chest by his relative. In 1920, when returned soldiers were splashing their war bonuses about, the Wellington Racing Club handled £153,000 at its spring meeting. Last week the amount put through was £40,000. The profit on the Oamaru Labour Day fixture, about £ls, would have represented a loss of just on £125 had there not been a rebate of 1 per cent, on totalisator tax for this financial year. “Chide .... was supposed to be one of the greatest horses that ever came out of New Zealand,” says a Sydney paper, in referring to the death of the Paladin gelding. Only a few blind partisans ever thought anything of the kind. One of the failures in the Melbourne Cup was the Queenslander Lough Neagh, winner of the Randwick Plate. Lough Neagh had only 7.12 in the Cup, over a stone under w.f.a., and this makes the older horses in Australia look moderate. While only two three-year-olds have figured in the winning list for the New Zealand Cup, during the last 32 years, horses of that age have won the Melbourne Cup ten times in the same period. Indianapolis followed up his good effort at Oamaru, where he finished second to Craganour, by a smart win at Wellington, and he promises to start favourite for the Derby next week. It should not be forgotten, however, that on Labour Day he finished only a head in front of another Derby candidate in Cloudy Range. Harold Logan easily defeated Red Shadow in the Cup Trial at Petone, giving him 12 yards, but it will not be so easy in the Cup itself when he is called on to concede 48 yards. A lot will depend on how the Cup is run, but fast or slow, the backmarker will be up against it in Royal Silk. At Oamaru, the Bryce-trained candidate was going away from the champion at the end, and looks likely to do it again when receiving 60 yards in the Cup.

B. Brodie is to ride Great Star in the Stewards’ Handicap.

Nominations for the Forbury Park Trotting Club's meeting are due on Thursday at 5 p.m. Five of the Melbourne Cup field were New Zealanders. Seven New Zealand jockeys rode in the race, and eleven of the starters were trained by New Zealanders.

Korokio won last year’s Oaks from Fast Passage, but in this year’s Cup she is in receipt of a fair amount of weight from the Kiccarton mare, and probably will need it all. Silver Scorn was under offer to an Australian buyer, but the option was allowed to expire without business eventuating. The price would be a high one.

Chide’s career in Australia yas a chequered one ail through, and it ended rather ignominiously when he finished "last in a handicap on the final day of the A.J.C. meeting. The “official” safety number at six furlongs at Riccarton is 24. There are 27 acceptors for the Linwood Handicap, but there is not likely to be a division, as it is understood that the barrier will be widened.

There are seventeen acceptors for the New Zealand Cup, but two of them— Red Sun and Earthquake—have been paid up for in the Riccarton Handicap also, and may be more at home in that class.

Denis Boy, who has won the Caulfield Cup, Metropolitan and Cantala Stakes, was bred in Ireland. His owner, Mr Wallace, is an Irishman, who made money on the Australian goldfields and then returned to his native isle. He sent the horse to Sydney to be trained, but has never seen him since.

L. J. Ellis has been engaged to ride Shatter (Cup), Merry Peel (Stewards), Southdown (Welcome), Tout le Mond, lan’s March and Tippling, at Riccarton on Saturday. A. Eastwood’s Cup day rides include Fast Passage (Cup), The Quorn (Stewards), Silver Scorn, Drumfire and Fracas.

Merry Peel’s name did not appear in the list of of first acceptors for the Stewards’ Handicap as received by papers south of Christchurch. He was included in the telegrams to the North Island, and apparently was dropped from the southern message in the Christchurch telegraph office. Trouble between the Winton Trotting Club and the trustees of the Winton racecour.. has been referred by the Minister of Internal Affairs to the Commissioner of Crown Lands in Invercargill. The trustees have fixed the rent of the Winton course at £250 for the day. which the Trotting Club considers is far too high. Seven horses handicapped for the Apprentices' Race at Riccarton were not eligible. New conditions for this event, made last year and continued this year, rule out a horse who has won a race of six furlongs or under at the time of starting. The seven concerned were Late Jest, Craigavon, Eminent, Revision, Palantua, Tippling and Fleeting Glance. It is understood that, the appeal lodged against the decision in the Blue Metal-Mount Boa case is based on the ground that the owner and trainer of Blue Metal were not present during the hearing of evidence. The trainer of Blue Metal, it is stated, could not be found at the time the inquiry opened, but after evidence had been taken, it was read over to him, and he was given an opportunity to question the jockeys if he wished to do so. The result of the Melbourne Cup has disposed of all arguments concerning the Australasian three-year-old championship, and obviously Peter Pan is the colt of the year. The field included Liberal, the V.R.C. Derby winner; Oro, held by his admirers to have been unlucky in the A.J.C. classic, and Gaine Carrington, reputedly the best of the New Zealanders. None of these was ever in the picture, and as stayers they are not in Peter Pan’s class. The New Zealand contingent were not prominent in this year’s Melbourne Cup, except Manawhenua, who finished fourth. He was not mentioned in the radio broadcast owing to the announcer confusing him with Rogilla. Admiral Drake was close up in the early stages, but apparently broke down, and finished a furlong behind the rest. Gaine Carrington was never mentioned, it was the same with Compris, and Peter Jackson was always near the rear.

Ayrmont Chimes has been withdrawn from all his engagements at the New Zealand Metropolitan Trotting Club’s November meeting. His Oamaru fall was the third of its kind that has happened to Ayrmont Chimes, and a satisfactory explanation is given for each occurrence. Notwithstanding, J. Bryce deems it advisable to cease racing him meanwhile, and after a period of rest the son of Four Chimes will be recommissioned. Harold Logan was under a cloud on the eve of last year’s Trotting Cup, and could not have won had the race been run straight out. He just scraped into the final, but the run did him good and he won the deciding heat two days later. This year everything seems to be going well with the champion, and three fast races—at New Brighton, Oamaru and Petone —have brought him to the top of his form. While he has a big task in front of him, he should be in the money on Tuesday. The Randwick trainer F. McGrath is having a phenomenal season in big races this season. He trains Denis Boy, who has won the Metropolitan at Randwick, and Cantala at Flemington; and Peter Pan, A.J.C. Derby. Melbourne Cup, Melbourne Stakes and Rosehill Guineas. McGrath was supremely confident concerning the result of yesterday’s race, and probably could retire in affluence on his season’s winnings. It is necessary to go back to Tangihou’s year (1915) to find fewer than a. dozen starters in a New Zealand Cup, and this year’s field will be up to the average in numbers. There were only nine runners when Tangihou won, but the smallest fields were those beaten by Tiralleur (1889), British Lion (1891), and Grand Rapids (1904), when there were eight starters. It is rather a coincidence that the smallest fields have been among the worst in quality. The biggest Cup field was 21, in 1908, when the “circus horse” Downfall won. Practically the whole of this year’s Derby field has to be taken on trust so far as staying is concerned, but there is no certainty that it will be a stayers’ race. Two of the three with the best records over shorter distances are fillies —La Moderne and Silver Scorn —and it may be that a filly will win both Derby and Oaks this year. This would be unusual, as since 1887 when the Oaks was instituted, the only fillies to win the Derby have been Florrie, Bluefire, Nightfall," Desert Gold and Enthusiasm. The time record for the Derby is 3.31 1-5, credited to Runnymede and Bronze Eagle. Runnymede went to Australia at a high figure, and proved a rank failure. Nightmarch 9.6 holds the weightcarrying record for the New Zealand Cup since the principal event of the

Carnival was run under that name, and Chide's 3.23 3-5 is the fastest time. When the event was known as the Canterbury Jockey Club Handicap (up till 1882), Mr M. Studholme’s Knotting - ly won under 10.6, and Peeress under 10.2, but Knottingly took 3.47 and Peeress 3.50 for the two miles. The “real stayers” that old-timers talk about really did nothing but sprint home at the end of slow-run races, and up till 1882 the record for the Cup was 3.361. Then Welcome Jack, carrying 6.5, cut it down to 3.34. The first horse to break 3.30 was Rosefeldt in 1893, when 3,29 was posted.

B. H. Morris is to ride Drumfire in the Derby, while L. G. Morris will be on Rocket. The appeal against the decision of the South Canterbury Jockey Club’s stewards in the Blue Metal-Mount Boa case is to be heard by the Canterbury District Committee on Tuesday night. The first race at Riccarton on Saturday (Cup Day) is timed to start at 12.30. On the second and third days (when the programme will comprise seven races), the first race is to begin at 1.10. The Oamaru Jockey Club has appointed a sub-committee, consisting of Drs. Fitzgerald and Smith Morton and Mr J. O'Brien to meet a committee from the Oamaru Trotting Club to discuss the question of beautifying the grounds at the racecourse. The following appointments were made: Handicapper, galloping events, Mr J. Henrys, judge, Mr C. E. Hassall; clerk of course, Mr P. L. Donald. The Programme Committee was instructed to draw up a programme for the summer meeting, giving stakes not exceeding £IOSO, an increase of £65 on the stakes given at last year's summer meeting. There are no three-year-olds in this year’s New Zealand Cup field, and it is 27 years since a horse of that age won outright. That was Noctuiform. who was perhaps the greatest “moral” that ever went to the two-mile starting post at Riccarton. He had just returned from Randwick, where he beat his stable-mate Sun God by ten lengths in the A.J.C. Derby (with Lady Wallace, who went on to win the Victorian Derby, fifteen lengths further back, and the rest hopelessly distanced) in ssec under the record for the race. Noctuiform was sold after the Randwick meeting for 5000gns to an English buyer, but a condition of the sale was that he was to run out his C.J.C. engagements in the interests of Mr G. G. Stead, and he followed up his Cup victory by annexing the Derby and the Canterbury Cup. In England he went wrong, and proved a bad bargain, as so many other high-priced exportations have done. The only three-year-old to achieve success in the Cup since Noctuiform was Indigo, who was adjudged to have dead-heated with Warstec. -

Gay Crest will be rideen in the New Zealand Cup by A. E. Didham. who will be on Top Rank in the Welcome Stakes The North Canterbury Racing Club whose meeting on Labour Day was abandoned owing to rain, has received permission of the Canterbury Jockey Club to hold a meeting at Riccarton on November 26th. The sanction of the Racing Conference will be forthcoming, and it is now necessary to secure only the permission of the Minister oi Internal Affairs.