THE NEW ZEALAND CUP.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1484, 3 October 1918, Page 12

THE NEW ZEALAND CUP.

Five aged horses are engaged in the New Zealand Cup, thirteen six-year-olds, thirteen five years, three four years and two three-year-olds, making 36 in all. Eight mares are entered, four horses, and 24 geldings. Thirteen mares have won since the race was 'first run and called the Canterbury Jockey Club Handicap, twenty-seven horses and twelve geldings. Thirteen four-year-olds have won, eight aged horses, nine six-year-olds, eleven five-year-olds, and thirteen three-year-olds, but three-year-olds have been less in evidence than they were three decades ago. Four-year-olds have won on nine out of the last twelve occasions, and on the two last occasions the fastest time was registered, viz., 3min. 25 l-ssec., unless we accept that credited to Bridge (3min. 25sec.) and disputed. Since the distance was increased to two miles in 1867, Tambourini is the only gelding that won with over 8.5, the weight Grand Rapids had, and Tambourini had 9.9. Client has 9.1. Lady Zetland (8.9) won in 1896, since when no mare has won carrying as much as Margerine has. No five-year-old gelding has won with as much as 8.9, the weight Sasanof has. Knottingly won with 10.6, Peeress with 10.2, Guy Fawkes with 9.10, Tambourini with 9.9, and these weights were carried during the first ten years, since when 8.9 is the highest weight won with, and Le Loup, Tasman, Vanguard and Lady Zetland each had that impost. Derritt rode three winners, two in succession, and had a dead-heat after a lapse of fifteen years. Huxtable, P. White, L. H. Hewitt, S. Lindsay each had two wins in succession, and Lindsay had three wins in all, and thus comes next to Derritt. Carter, Lyford, J. Wattie and L. Wilson are other riders that each had two wins. ’Frisco is the only sire that has won the Cup that has a representative engaged. Martian’s progeny have won on three occasions. Five of. his gets are engaged, and four of them — Sasanof, Menelaus, Snub and Margerine—represent good staying form, and Mascot, the other one, may do better as a five-year-old than as a four, and she has some pretensions to staying. Battle Song and Dusky Eve, by Signor, and Client and Red Ribbon have good staying pedigrees. Cynic and Fleetham are the only two Englishbred horses engaged. Risingham is the only one engaged that has never won a race, but he started 14 times last season and was only placed once.

The Champion Plate (1% miles), to be run at the spring meeting of the Wellington Racing Club this month, has attracted 24 entries, including Biplane, Gloaming, Finmark, Killowen, and Kilhope. Much curiosity will be awakened as the result of the nomination of the first-named pair, in view of their engagements at Caulfield and Flemington, but R.. J. Mason’s intentions are certain to be divulged within the next few days. Evidently Mr. Lowry’s three-year-olds will return to the Dominion after the A.J.C. meeting at Randwick, while probably Desert Gold and Estland will fulfil engagements at Caulfield and Flemington. Desert Gold’s defection from the Champion Plate has undoubtedly had the effect of increasing the field for this event, which on the last three occasions has been won by the brilliant daughter of Aurarius. Among the entrants for the Champion Plate is the Waikato-owned and trained Mangamahoe.

Desert Gold, judging from her latest reported gallop of a mile and aquarter, is going as well as ever she did; indeed, the time, 2min. outside the hurdles, a cable tells us, eclipsed all records for Bandwick. It may here be remarked that when another great mare, Cruciform, was taken there in the spring of 1903, fifteen years ago, she put up a mile and a-quarter gallop on the same course which remained a track record until quite recently. Desert Gold holds quite a number of track records both in New Zealand and Australia, as did Cruciform, and a number of race records, too, but while this is so and she is on all hands allowed to be a great mare, all her time achievements in public over different distances have been beaten by .other flyers in the colonies under different courses and weight conditions, if the “fastest times on record” tabulations are taken as a. guide in determining the question of speed and staying.