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MERYIN Le ROY— President of the Hollywood Turf Club, which inaugurates its. annual meeting this afternoon. s j j I ] ! ; : ! Lift Curtain Today At Hollywood Park Llangollen Trio Tops Smart Field of Eleven Contesting 8,400 Premiere Handicap HOLLYWOOD PARK, Inglewood, Calif., May 8. — Hollywood Park inaugurates what is expected to be another banner 55-day session here Thursday with the 17th running of the tracks oldest stakes race, the 8,400 gross Premiere Handicap at six furlongs. Eleven of the 13 nominees, including the four highweights, have accepted racing secretary John Maluvius imposts for the inaugural feature. If all go postward it will net the winner 6,100. Picking up the high impost of 124 pounds will be Llangollen Farms Porterhouse, a double stakes winner here last meeting, who will, in all likelihood, be ridden by Johnny Longden. Longden has also been named overnight for Llangollens two other Premiere entrants, Social Climber, 118, and The Chaplain, 109. Major opposition to the powerful Llangollen triumvirate is expected to come from Alfred G. Vanderbilts Find, 123, a triple stakes winner in 1956 in the east, and J. W. Rodgers Due de Fer, the six-year-old son of Spy Song who was voted the best sprinter at the last Santa Anita meeting. Others entered Thursday are the Mrs. Ada L. Rice entry of Call Me Lucky, 112, and Flight History, 113; John Metzgers Better Weapon, 110; Mr. and Mrs. Bert W. Martins Head Man, 115, a former Wood Memorial winner who brought 3,000 at a C. V. Whitney sale at Pomona last March; May Chaos Coverit, the only filly in the race, 108, and Mr. and Mrs. George Lewis Lucky G. L., 107. Neves Rides Due de Fer George Taniguchi has been named overnight on both the Rice starters, Ismael Valenzuela will be up on Better Weapon, Ralph Neves is on Due de Fer, Don Lewis rides Head Man, Ray York gets the mount on Find, Willie Skuse will be astride Coverit and Hank Moreno gets the call on Lucky G. L. If two or all three of the Llangollen starters parade, the entry may earn the role of favoritism because of its numerical edge and the preference each of them has shown for the Hollywood Park strip. Porterhouse has always raced brilliantly here, in fact, nipped Swaps in the Californian last season; Social Climber won two stakes at the last meeting, and The Chaplain has always performed well here. All three have been training in splendid fashion, with Porterhouse appearing especially sharp. In no case, however, is the entry expected to be favored by much over Due de Fer. This brown horse raced with distinction at Santa Anita and has been a stakes winner in each of his five seasons of campaigning. He also has been training in sensational fashion for Monte Parke. Find, winner of the New Orleans Cap, Excelsior and Narragansett Special last Continued on Page Ten Hollywood Inaugurates Season of Fifty-Five Days Llangollen Trio Tops Brilliant Field Named for Premiere Cap Continued from Page Six year will be making his 1957 debut. He has drilled sharply for trainer Bill Winfrey, but the talented seven-year-old son of Discovery may need more distance to show his best. He should be more at home in the seven-furlong Los Angeles Handicap on May 18 and the mile and a sixteenth Cali-fornian on May 25. The races "Dark horse" is the roan Head Man, a son of Eight Thirty with a world of speed and an apparent liking for the Hollywood strip if workouts are to be taken as conclusive. Call Me Lucky and Flight History are both newcomers to western racing fans. Both appear to be essentially speed horses and they could be dangerous at the weights. Call Me Lucky won the Magic City Handicap at Gulfstream this winter, whipping Nances Lad, while Flight History only missed by a nose of beating Sea O Erin in last years Midwest Handicap. Of the others, only Lucky G. L. has won stakes, the son of Sullivan having captured the Berkeley last year. Better Weapon was second in the Burlingame at Bay Meadows this semester, while Coverit, although a filly endowed with plenty of foot, would seem to be most ambitiously placed amongst these rough masculine foes.
