TURF TOPICS.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1367, 6 July 1916, Page 10

TURF TOPICS.

New Zealand Cup nominations are due on Friday. ♦ * * ❖ Mr. H. R. McKenzie has named his Elysian—Lady Glen colt Mentimore. * * * * Tom Cannon, the English jockey, celebrated his 70th birthday on April 23rd. • * * * The South Canterbury meeting, a Hunt Club fixture, will be held on July 20th. * * * * The value of the New Zealand Cup remains the same as last year, viz., 2000sovs. War Tax and Surtax were horses that won by long margins on Saturday at Hastings. Bodenham is racing like a consistent third-rater amongst the hack hurdlers. « • * » M. Hobbs had members of his team engaged at Canterbury Park, Sydney, on Saturday. The National Government do not intend to move for any curtailment of racing in the Dominion. * * ♦ * Four seconds and two-thirds has been Mr. E. J. Watt’s unlucky Randwick record this season. ¥ * * * In Sydney there is just now a cry of too much racing. The proprietary people are overdoing things. ♦ * • Cheloma is owing punters a bit now. The English-bred filly does not represent hack form yet. War Tax, by Downshire from Malsterette, won a two-yeai-old race on June 20th at Gosford Park, N.S.W. * ♦ * V Mr. J. O. E. Jackson has engaged Marconi at the Wellington and New Zealand Grand National meetings. *** '.’ Jockeys and trainers should apply for their licenses before July 10th with the District Committees. D. J. Price has been granted a license by the V.R.C. committee, and will shortly be training in Victoria again. St. Omer, who ran so well at the Hawke’s Bay meetings, won the same race at Napier Park last year as she won this year. as * * * At the Ascot (N.S.W.) meeting last month twelve events, including divisions, were run off between the hours of 12 noon and 4 p.m. » ♦ * ♦ El Gallo’s only nomination at the Wellington meeting is in the Winter Steeplechase. It is any odds he won’t be there. sj: * * Le Noir, by Traquair from Roscommon, sold for 1025gns. as a yearling, won a welter at the Melbourne Hunt meeting on June 21st —his first win. * * * * Austin does not improve upon his second and third essays, but is getting some useful experience and may do better when the going is firmer. « * * * A lot of people are just now wondering why El Gallo was not nominated for the New Zealand Grand National meeting. * * * * A. J. McFlinn and F. Flynn are having a close go for the cross-country jockey premiership, and McDonald is almost on terms with them. * ♦ • Nominations for the chief jumping races of the C.J.C. New Zealand Grand National and the Winter Cup closed on Friday with satisfactory results. El Gallo was not nominated for the Winter Hurdles at the Wellington R.C. meeting. He has not been jumped since he won the Great Northern Steeplechase. $ * * * Some of the clubs have discussed the notices of motion which are to come before the Racing Conference, and will instruct, their delegates how to vote on each. Hr * * In twenty days’ racing at Randwick £109,000 was given in stakes. The A.J.C. for fourteen days gave nearly £94,000 in stakes, or nearly an average of £7OOO per day. Mr. E. W. Alison, jun., will be sending Ngatoa to Wellington for the coming meeting, and he has also nominated that gelding for the N.Z. Grand National and other races, and some of the yearlirgs purchased in Australia for C.J.C. classic events.

Bodenham’s showing on the opening day at Hawke’s Bay was not a pleasing one. He did better on the second day, but ran against a snag in Surtax. *** * 7 . Some nice yearlings were having a dress rehearsal on the opening day of the Hawke’s Bay Jockey Club’s meeting, and some of them are forward for the time of the year. * * * * Some of the racing clubs in our sister colonies have reduced blacksmiths’ risks to a minimum. Owners or trainers must pay them spot cash for their services on racecourses in removing shoes and plates. Otara is evidently a useful son of Gazeley, taking aftei his sire in colour, chestnut. His dam, Te Aorangi, was a three-quarter sister Knight of Athol, a good grey performer in the Auckland province. * * * * Tararu Jack did not fall, as reported in some papers, on the opening day of the Hawke’s Bay meeting. His backers fell, and he gave such a poor exhibition that his running was enquired into. Julian’s explanation was accepted. * * ♦ ♦ Tarero was much fancied for the Hawke’s Bay Steeplechase, but though he won a hunt club event over the same country in October the weight he had and the going and the more solid opposition proved too trying for the little fellow. Naupata has been all to pieces since he ran at Wanganui. Steeplechasing, since he fell while schooling at Porirua prior to that meeting, seems to

have gone against his inclinations, and he seemed so sore at Ellerslie that surprise was expressed when he was found to be engaged at the Hawke’s Bay meeting. ***S: For the first time at a winter meeting the Wellington Racing Club will have eight races per day on its programme this month. So that the gathering will be concluded in daylight, an early start is to be made, and the first event will be run at 11.30 a.m. * * ♦ ♦ Taumatawhakatangihangakoauau is said to be the name of a remote native settlement in Hawke’s Bay. It must have escaped the notice of some owners we have met who invariably try to outdo each other in selecting lengthy Maori names for their racehorses. This one would cut up conveniently into sections. * * .k .r Bucklaw, by Earlston from Velox, by Bill of Portland from Tea Rose, by Martini-Henri, is talked of in a Derby connection in Victoria. Adam Skirving trains him, and old Auckland friends would like to read of Skirving leading Bucklaw in a winner.

The Dunedin owner, Mr. R. ActonAdams, whose horses are trained at Porirua, has engaged Rocksalt (Roke,by—lima) and the Martian —Hebrew Maid filly in the Dunedin Stakes, to be run at Wingatui in the spring. The same owner has a filly by Demosthenes, from Formula, running out on Mr. G. P. Donnelly’s place. ♦ * < * Not since Kaitere won the Napier Park Steeplechase in 1906, carrying 12.0, has so much weight as Braeburn won with been borne to victory. That gelding had 11.3, lib. more than Glenmore won with last year. Twenty years ago Mutiny carried 12.3, the highest impost yet won with. The Spaniard holds the time record (6.34) for the three miles. ♦ ♦ * * In a list of forty-one ponies under 14.2, Lady Elysian, who is not yet three years old, was at the top with 9.4. Gluson, another New Zealander, received 7.9. This was at one of the suburban meetings in Sydney. In a 14.1 class Lady Elysian received 10.6 with a 7.7 minimum. Carrying 9.10 she recently won from a good field. * * * * At a special meeting of the committee of the Westland Racing Club notification was received of the annual conference of country racing clubs at Wellington on the 11th inst. Mr. D. J. Evans was appointed delegate to the conference. The annual report of the chairman of the conference was read and received. The meeting approved of the proposal for a minimum weight of 7st. for racing events. * * v ❖ The following is a list of winning owners in Australia of over 2000sovs.:

W. Dailey, £7237 10s.; G. Barnett, £6347; D. U. Seaton, £6119; W. Booth, £4801; R. Crawford, £4334; W. Brown, £4181; L. K. S. Mackinnon, £4591; W. E. Bidwill, £3396 10s.; A. G‘. White, £3060; Hunter White, £2973; A. Foley, £2307; J. R. Whitbourne, £2166. Last year Ciontaft, an Australian hurdle and steeplechasing gelding, was nominated for the New Zealand Grand National Hurdles and Grand National Steeplechase with the secretary of the Canterbury Jockey Club. This year there was an endeavour to get entries from the Commonwealth, but El Progresso is the only entrant from the Island Continent. * * * * Steve Howie, who sustained a fracture of the left leg when Glenquinn fell with him in the First Steeplechase at Randwick recently, is on the road to recovery in St. Vincent’s Hospital. He has decided to retire from the saddle and devote his time to training. With such a clean record and experience, says the “Sun,” it is safe to predict that he will not lack patrons, especially those who support cross-country events.

Jullundur, who won the V.R.C. Grand National Hurdle Race Handicap in smin. 45t4sec. —record time for the race —was mentioned in these columns recently as a probable winner. A horse that can run a mile in lmin. 41sec., bred as he is, is worthy, of respect. He is a five-year-old by imported Challenger, and has raced prominently on the flat. * * * • Portland Ladv, winner of the Whakatu Hack Handicap Hurdle Race, is one of the first of Achilles’ stock to race over hurdles. She is a seven-year-old, cvned by Mr. J. H. Prosser. Her dam, Portland Lass, is of the No. 3 family, by Bill of Portland from Chester’s daughter Aorere, who is from a good family in Australia, going back to Melesina, imported. * * * Sam Pan’s June Steeplechase victory on Saturday at the Hawke’s Bay J.C. meeting was well earned. This gelding was not set a herculean task to beat Bravest in receipt of 131 b., but only succeeded in doing so by a neck. Sam Pan looks a more useful sort than he has proved so far, but the heavy going was in his favour, and no doubt the sen of San Fran was in excellent condition. He ran in the new ownership of Mr. Gerald Stead. « » • • The running of Auckland horses on the opening day of the Hawke’s Bay meeting was not attended with better results than at the Napier Park meeting the previous week, and on the second day a third credited to Golborne in the June Steeplechase

was the nearest any owner got to a dividend. Golborne carried a bit of money of stay-at-home. Aucklanders. * * * » The nominations for the New Zealand Grand National meeting, the entries for the chief events of which closed on Friday night, were not disclosed per medium of the N.Z. Press Association in the hitherto usual way, and no mention was made of them in the morning or evening papers on Saturday, but on Monday we were informed that El Progresso was nominated from Australia and that El Gallo had not been nominated at all. The Hon. J. D. Ormcnd’s stable was out of luck at the Hawke’s Bay Jockey Club’s meeting, as also at Napier Park, considering the number of horses he has. Gladful won the hurdles at Napier Park, Hylatus secured the Ladies’ Bracelet at the Hawke’s Bay meeting, and some place money was picked up with other members of the Karamu team. Vascular should improve as a cross-coun-try proposition with further experience.