SPORTING.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXVIV, Issue 78, 8 March 1916, Page 6

SPORTING.

A well-known Riccarton trainer who has been on a jaunt to the North Island told me a giiod story about a happening at the Woodvlilc meeting, says a South Island writer. He travelled to the meeting with a wellknown Hastings trainer, who lias in

his stables horses owned by some of the biggest men in the land. Going down in the train the trainer gave him one of i.Hb big mao’s cheques for £2O (he usually bets iu £100’s), and he told me during a long conversation that lie wanted him to put the amount on his horse to-morrow, and. of course, there was the usual palaver about telling no one, etc., etc., Ho! ho! thought the Ricoartonite—giving me a cheque the day before. He does not usually do tins. And—the owner going to put a whole £2O on when he usually puts it on in centuries. Hello! £2O found if I’m any judge. Thus musing to himself, he pretended to fall asleep, and then decided to go to the track in the morning, and look at the horse. Judge his surprise when the horse was not worked, and then the theory hardened that the animal was a non-trier and the £2O was a sling-away in case the stewards asked questions. Arrived on the course at the races the southerner espied the horse, which was hull fat, and more like a mare in leal than a horse lit to race. Thus firmly convinced that the animal was a non-trier, the Ricoartonite put the £2O in his pocket. Before the race the trainer found him, and asked him for the tickets, but the southerner was ready for him, and had a heap of old tickets tied up with cotton which he risked. Of course the horse was unplaced, and no questions were asked, so probably to this day the Hastings trainer has not undone his bundle of tickets. When he does he will wake up to the fact that theie are others in. fife game who are as smart as he is.