THE TURF

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2489, 16 June 1915, Page 11

THE TURF

NOTES AND COMMENTS IBx Gibncoe.] 1 t ] l Frida y Best, at 9 p.m., Mr. A. K Whyte, seoretary of the WellingI? n cm ° Club, irill take entries foi the different handicaps at the Winter Meeting to be held next month. Very satisfactory acceptances have been received for the different events at the Hawke's Bay Meeting, which opens on Friday next. The different handicaps bear a most open appearance. Hap Dha is in future to race in. the name of Mr. A. Burgess, who will also tram the Obligado gelding and Multoe. •. In the principal flat race at Hastings on Friday, Beldame will be ridden by J. O'Shea, Portraiture (A. Oliver), Wild Lupin (H. Goldfinch), Hymettius (W. Adams), Haumakaka (B. Deeley), Ardent (C. Price), and Blackheart (L. Wilson). The imported horse Nassau, owned by Mr. G. L. Stead, is expected to arrive here by the Rcmuera on Monday next. H. Cairns, who has been out of luck for a. long time in Victoria, scored a winning bracket at the Mentone Meeting on June 9, when his mount, Minnoboro, won the Steeplechase. Included amongst the winners at tho V.R.C. Birthday Meeting on June 7 was the New Zealand-bred Golden Rock (Gold Reef—Edith Cureton), who won the Cromwell Handicap, one mile. The Auckland-owned Bhiestone is to be nominated for the Wellington Racing Club's Winter Meeting. As the grey gelding is a good mud horse he will doubtless be brought south for the meeting. Tito recent reoruits to the hurdle ranks at Wingatui are Vocation,- the half-brother to Reputation, and Golden King, who won the D.J.C. Birthday Handicap. After a short spell Chortle has resumedwork, at Gisborne, and it is mora than likely that he will .figure amongst the entrants for the Grand National Hurdles. At present he is being exercised over hilly country and on the beach. In the opinion of the chief stipendiary steward, Mr. J. M'Malon, some of riding at the recent Auckland Meeting was poor in the extreme, and a word of advice was tendered by that olEcial to several horsemen. The recent winter meeting of the Duncdin Jockey Club was the most successful, from a financial point of view, ever held at Wingatui. The club has made a donation of £500 to the Wounded Soldiers' Fund, which brings its total contributions to various patriotic fluids, since the war began, to nearly £2000. C. Emerson is leaving for Sydney tomorrow, and will spend a few weeks there. He will not accept a retainer for next season, but will ride as a free lance. A Melbourne paper mentions that J. N. M'Gregor will ride Tim Doolan in the Victorian Nationals. This is a mistake, as the Auckland horseman, A. J. M'Flinn, is retained by Mr. G. L. Stead and left Auckland last week for Melbourne, to ride Tim Doolan, The Polo, and Sauci in their engagements. In commenting on Mr. E. J. Watt's colt Mountain Knight's Australian performances, tho London "Sporting Life" says that a curious feature of tho colt's pedigree is tho absence of Blacklock blood in the last four removes, Australian breeders thereby proving again that "unfashionable" blood, if judiciously distributed, is not of less efficiency than "fashionable blood" injudiciously, accumulated. The talent use isome queer metaphors when their exuberance finds vent. A party were contrasting certain' jockeys recently, when the name of a wellknown rider cropped up. "Him!" said aii admirer, rapturously, "why. he'd win a race on a bally oil-drum!"