DUNEDIN JOCKEY CLUB.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume III, Issue 146, 11 May 1893, Page 6

DUNEDIN JOCKEY CLUB.

This club bring off their usual Winter Meeting on May 24 (Queen’s Birthday) and the following Saturday, May 27, and the acceptances for three of the first day’s handicaps will be found in another column of this issue. In the principal event of the meeting, the Birthday Handicap, Mr Dowse’s adjustments have met with a f ood response from owners, but there has een a big weeding out in both the Tradesmen’s Handicap and the Hurdles. The Handicap Hurdle Race of 80 sovs, about two miles, will commence the proceedings, and as I have indicated above the acceptance is not a good one, only half a ; dozen having paid up. Magpie is top weight with 11.13, and though he is giving from 101 b to 361 b to his various opponents I think he will take a lot of beating. I have however a fancy that the race will fall to Rebel, to whom Magpie is conceding exactly a stone, and it is this pair I look to to fight out the finish. - The 16 left in the Birthday Handicap of 300 sovs, one mile and a half, are mostly of a good class. With Stepniak, 9.5, eliminated, Prime Warden is now top weight at 9.0. He' has hitherto been on the whole anything but lucky in handicaps on the Forbury course, but 9 0 and the distance to be traversed how are well within his compass, and I shall expect him to run a great horse if his stable rely on him on the day in preference to Saracen or Lady Zetland, both of which also have been accepted with. Hippomenes comes next in the list with 8.3. Last year with 11b more he was favourite »for this very race, but had to knock under at the finish to the moderate Don Pedro. As I think a mile and a half is’a. bit longer than he cares for I will discard him for this race. T do not care for S® < : X. ■ ■ ■ -

Saracen’s chance at 8.1, and the distance is a bit further than Heather Bell, 7.12, likes. Conjuror, 7.10, has been in a winning vein lately and inay have a say. I do not care for Cajolery at 7.9, for sprinting is more his game. Retina is well enough treated at 7.8, which is but 11b more than she won the same race with two years back, but she is at the best an uncertain lady to trust. One day she runs a rattling good race and a few days afterwards a donkey could head her. If only in the humour on the 24th inst. she will just about credit Mr Martin with his second Dunedin Birthday Handicap. Tempest, 7.7, is another that is well dealt by, and as the course is one of her and her owner’s happy hunting grounds she should be close handy at the finish. Lady Zetland, 7.6, is another mare whose chance I like, and I shall be quite prepared to find her the elect of Messrs M. and 0. Hobbs’ stable on the day. She is a game little bit of stuff and will, I feel sure, run a good race if wanted. Among those below her in the list the only one I have any fancy for is The Dreamer, 6.8. Whakawatea, 9.2, is top weight in the Tradesmen’s Handicap of izosovs, one mile, and deservedly so. There is no need for me to recapitulate even a tithe of his meritorious performances over sprint courses. He has some brilliant records, and his latest running in the C.J.C.’s Challenge Stakes and the Derby Handicap at Wellington shows that he has come back to his two-year-old form. A mile is well within his compass and he should take a lot of beating on the day. His stable companion Heather Bell comes next in the list at 8 Jo, but I have no liking for her. Vogengang, 8.7, has been running very indifferently of late, and seems to have lost all his two-year-old form. Travelling further down the list I stop at Liberator, 8.0, and then my eye catches as well treated Au Revoir at 7.9, and Paramu at 7.2. But as weight doesn’t stop a good ’un over a short course I should take Whakawatea to be equal to the task of winning.