TROTTING NOTES.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 190, 12 August 1931, Page 12

TROTTING NOTES.

Acceptances for the third day of the Metropolitan Trotting Club’s meeting will close at noon to-morrow. * * * * Nominations for the Auckland Trotting Club’s meeting will close on Friday. * * * * The Auckland Trotting Club made a loss on last season’s working of £4870 Os 7d. * * * * The special race meeting held by the Auckland Trotting Club on August 30 and September 1 last year for the Unemployment Fund, resulted in a profit of £7494 10s. * * * * The assets of the Auckland Trotting Club are set out in the balance-sheet for the year ending July 31 as £154,898 14 s Id. The Auckland Trotting Club gave away £29,350 in stakes last season and paid Government taxes of £34,116 16s 2d. * * * * Mr J. E. August, who has been elected president of the Wellington Trotting Club, is well known in the sport, with which he has been associated for a number of years. His father raced horses in Canterbury in the early days, one of the best known being Blackchild, a very fine trotter. Mr J. E. August, associated with one of his brothers, raced horses in the North Island. He is a brother to the wellknown trainer, S. M. August, who is now located in Auckland.

When the last mail left America the trotting and pacing season had only just started, but even so the juveniles were recording fast times. In a pacing event for two-year-olds Quite Sure won a heat in 2min lOJsec, and Ed. Jnr. won heats in 2min lOlsec and 2min 12isec.

While trotting in Sydney may not be of so high a standard as obtains in New Zealand, or perhaps it would be more correct to say so popular with the public, those controlling the sport are never afraid to bring into force rules which will not only prove beneficial, but are fair to all. For instance, in Sydney there is a minimum weight for drivers, there are distance posts erected inside which horses must be at the end of a race or risk having their future nomination refused for a certain period, and now a rule has been introduced fixing the maximum width of sulky to be used in races at 4ft 2in. Before the rule was passed an inspection of the sulkies used showed the width to vary from 3ft Sin to sft 2in.

The brood mare Intaglio was recently purchased by the Auckland owner, breeder and trainer, J. T. Paul, and will join the already useful band of matrons now on his farm. Intaglio is a wellbred mare by the champion, but now defunct, sire, Logan Pointer, and is out of Cameos (2.17). Cameos produced Onyx, holder of the grass track record of 3.13 against time, and who also has a two miles record of 4.23 4-5. Others produced by Cameos were Berenice (3.49 3-5) and Petronius (2.54 3-5), so it will be seen that Intaglio is well bred. Her first foal was First King, in 1922, and the following year she threw Windshield. Her next foal was Free Advice (4.25), the three mentioned being to Blue Mountain King. Mated with Al Mack, Intaglio produced a colt in 1925, and again in 1928, and last year she had a filly by Nelson Bingen. She may again be mated with Nelson Bingen, but the chances are J. T. Paul will prefer to associate her with his fine young horse, Great Parrish.

Under the heading “Trotting in Reverse ” the “ Sydney Sportsman,” one of the few papers in Australia regularly devoting space to the light harness sport, takes the New South Wales Progress Association to task over its recent action in applying a boycott to the Melbourne Thousand. The association is composed of owners and trainers, and though the boycott did not affect the Melbourne Thousand,

“ Sportsman ” states that it did affect the Victoria Park Thousand so much so that the paucity of entries caused the event to be abandoned after an unbroken run of sixteen years. The contention of the association was that £22 was too large a sum *to charge to start a horse. The association is now asking that there be no division races at Victoria Park. In its criticism

“ Sportsman ” says the request, in view of the large fields which would line up, is ridiculous, and concludes by remarking that if there are many more suggestions of the sort, the association might be termed not the progressive association, but the retrogressive association.