Sporting and Dramatic REVIEW AND Licensed Victuallers’ Gazette. With which is incorporated the Weekly Standard Thursday, January 4, 1906. THE AUCKLAND CUP.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XIV, Issue 826, 4 January 1906, Page 6

Sporting and Dramatic REVIEW AND Licensed Victuallers’ Gazette. With which is incorporated the Weekly Standard Thursday, January 4, 1906. THE AUCKLAND CUP.

Another Cup day has come and gone, and the name of Putty has been inscribed on the ever-lengthening list of winners, surely the worst named animal appearing upon it. The son of St. Leger owned ii-s victory in a very large measure to two contributing causes, tnese being splend d condition and able horsemanshp. The chestnut son of St. Leger and Ellerslie was in great buckle to take on the big contest, and during his whole career he has never looked better, this reflecting great credit upon his owner. This stood to him during the closing stage of the big race, when Deeley asked him the question, for he answered in the most resolute fashion to his rider’s call. At the same time the opin on has been fully expressed that if Buchanan . had allowed Mahutonga to run along in front, instead of having a battle with the Quilt gelding for the greater part of the journey, he would have repeated h-s victory of the previous year. On that occasion Mahutonga was allowed to run his own race, with such successful results that with but two pounds more in the sadd e to carry there does not seem much reason to have altered the tactics. However this s idle argument, and the fact remains that whether he was lucky or not Putty has won the Cap, and he makes the fifth on of St. Leger wha has pulled off the big event, the previous ones being St. Hippo (1892), Nestor (1896), Bluejacket (1899-1900), and St. Michael (1901). It is safe to say that of those who stood round the ringside at Sylvia Park in 1899 and heard poor Jim Philson trying to extract bids for Putty not one imagined for an instant that the youngster they were then regarding somewhat disdainfu ly was eventually to be cheered as an Auckland Cup winner. The Hon. Hugh Mosman bought the yearling for seventeen gu’neas, and gave him h s present absurd name. Proving a failure, he was sold to Mr. T. A. Williams for a slight advance, and scored his first win in such an unimportant event as the Third Hack Handicap at Avondale, in which he beat eight others. .He followed this up by winning the Maiden P ate at the A.R.C. Spring Meeting, and then put down a fair field in the Trial Handicap at the subsequent summer gathering. Another winning bracket was scored in the Ohinemuri Cup, which he won by a nose from that bete-noir of the pressman, Matamataharakiki. Next Putty was seen home in the van in the Tradesmen’s Handicap at the A.R.C. Autumn Meeting, while another win went to h's credit in the York Welter, when he defeated a strong field. It will thus be seen that as a four-year-old Putty ran very creditably, but as a five-year-o’d he went right off, and in thirteen starts never won a race. He started the ball go ng again last season by winning the Goldfields’ Cup at the Thames, and then annexed the Takapuna Jockey Club Handcap, beating Paritutu at a difference of four pounds. A long run of non-suc-cesses followed until he came home first in the Empire Handicap at Takapuna, and the next day pulled off the Britannia Handicap at the same meeting. This season, with an Avondale Cup and an Auckland Cup to his credit, Putty has done well. Mr. Williams can have no great reason to regret his original outlay of twenty-five guineas for the chestnut, for his stake earnings alone up to the Cup race have totalled the respectable sum of £2515, while by his victory in the big race the stable is credited with having had a good win.