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PROSPERITY OF THE AUSTRALIAN TURF Stake Entries Attain Remarkable Figures Despite Exactions of the Big War. The complete list of entries made last month for two and three-year-old races to be run at meetings of the Australian Jockey Club, has been issued, and for some of these there is a falling-off as compared with the corresponding nominations last year. In the case of the earlier two-year-old races the most marked decrease is associated with the Gim-crack Stakes, the total being twenty-four less, while the Breeders Plate has only nine fewer engaged. The chances are, however, that each race will attract quite as many runners as on the last occasion, when twenty-three started in the Breed- a crs Plate and twenty in the Gimcrack Stakes. Tho record field for the Breeders Plate is thirty-five, and for the Gimcrack: Stakes twenty-nine, but now that the former race Is restricted to colts and the latter to fillies, it may be n long time ere those figures are again reached. They were made when both races were open to youngsters of each sex. The autumn two-year-old races again filled well, and though there are a few less in the Sires Produce Stakes as compared with June, of 1916, the Champagne Stakes total is exactly the same. The figures for entries made last year and this arc as under; 1916 1917 Breeders Plate 155 140 Gimcrack Stakes 136 112 December Stakes ;291 264 Sires Produce Stakes 338 322 Champagne Stakes -415 415 A. J. C. Derby 407 416 St. Leger 380 381 The Derby entry is only nineteen short of the record for this particular race, but it would be safe to lay long odds against the 416 nominations being productive of twenty runners. The record in the way of starters stands at sixteen in the respective years of Cisco and Kilboy, and the comparative smallness of the field, as a rule, for such a valuable stake, is proof of the luck needed in buying yearlings with a view to winning important two or three-year-old races. However, with such rich prizes to be won the risk is worth biking by men who can afford it, but no matter how high a .price they may pay for a yearling, it is never a certainty they are getting something that will eventually be good enough to compete for a Derby, let alone win it. Sydney Referee.
