THE NEWMARKET HANDICAP

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 352, 20 March 1889, Page 3

THE NEWMARKET HANDICAP

Speaking of the race for bhe Newmarket Handicap, an Austialian scribe writes :—: — Gossip had been very busy with regard to the candidates. Moi"e particularly was tins the case in reference to Tradition and Carbine. The former, it was whimpered, had shown Phil Hey wood a wonderful trial, .ill on the quiet, at Caulfield ; and it was moreover averred that Mick OBrien would not ride Carbine, but take charge of the big horse. The "Argus" even publicly announced something to that effect ; and ib is, therefoie, not; surprising that the public was induced to back Tradition during the two days preceding the race. OBrien was, however, too manly to desert Mr Wallace, for whom he has scored so many victories ; and, although he would probably have sooner steered the horse in which he is said to bo interested, he remained faithful to his old employer, and, to the honest horseman's credit be it remembered, he was nob legally bound to take the mount of Carbine. To give him the mount of Cat bine in the peculiar circumstances was perhaps the greatest compliment an owner could pay to the honesty of a jockey. Mick O'Brien's position was indeed a peculiar one ; and. his friends, and he has many, would have soorer seen him a spectator of the race, lest it might happen he was just beaten on the post by his own horse. However, such a contretemps did nob occur. Sedition was eomparathely unnoticed; and of him it was said that he had ran" a trial during the week with Gladstone and Ernani, and had. been beaten comfortably by the firstnamed. Colour was given to this statement by the fact that Gladstone was backed in the paddock just before the race, while Sedition was comparatively unsupported, save by a few stragglers who sometimes bet in an apparently foolish manner, and then have the luck of it". That an outsider, should be beaten in a trial by another outsider was surely enough to make anyone wary of the chance. Carbine and Lochiel weie supported light up to the fall of the flag ; and a splendid start it appeared to be. In a short race at Fleming con it is difficult to say what horse is leading in the early pavb of the race. But ib certainly seemed as if Sedition was in front at the beginning, and that, moreover, she was never-fairly headed at any part of the journey. Paddy, in the rails on the far side of the grandstand, was making a bold bid just in«ide the distance post; and then the screams of "Lochiel,' "Caibine," indicated that the pair of cracks were engaged in a desperate struggle on the other side of the course. Sedition was by this time quite clear of them, and more in the centre, and was travelling fast enough to prevent her being caught. Carbine shifted a little under the whip, and that caused Lochiel also to alter his course, but that had no effect on the result, and Sedition, every inch taken out of her, won by what was officially given as three-quarters of a length. To others, however, the victory appeared to be a better one. as there seemed to be a fair space of daylight between Sedition's tail and Lochiel's nose. Lochiel gained his victory over Carbine by a neck, Churchill was fourth, and the number of outsiders who finished close up was quite a feature of the lace. Bookmakers cheered as the horses returned to scale, and backers looked despondent.