New Zealand Free For All

The New Zealand Pacing Free For All is a major New Zealand harness race. It is notable as it is a Group One championship sprint race and has been won by nearly every champion pacer in New Zealand. It was valued at $300,000, but was reduced to $200,000 due to economic pressures.^[1] Horses which have won the Free-for-all include hall of famers and champions who later shone in the United States and Canada like Cardigan Bay and Caduceus. The latter who won the Free For All three times. The race has also been won three times by Robalan, Harold Logan, Lordship and Author Dillon.^[2] Between 1942 and 1948 the race was renamed the New Zealand Pacing Sprint Championship.^[2]

The race is contested at Addington Raceway on the Show Day public holiday on the Friday of New Zealand Cup week in mid-November. With the New Zealand Trotting Cup run on the Tuesday of that week, the Free For All attracts most of the same horses as the Cup, and is often won in the same year by the same horse. Unlike the Cup, it is run over a sprint distance and from a mobile start. The 2008 race was won in record time (1.54 mile rate for 2000m) by Auckland Reactor. From 2012, the race will be contested over 1 mile (1609m), meaning the race will start on a bend.

Records

Most wins:

• 3 - Arthur Dillon (1918, 1919, 1920)
• 3 - Caduceus (1956, 1958, 1959)
• 3 - Harold Logan (1931, 1934, 1936)
• 3 - Lordship (1962, 1964, 1967)
• 3 - Robalan (1972, 1973, 1974)

Most wins by a driver:

• 7 - Tony Herlihy (1987, 1991, 1993, 1997, 2006, 2012)
• 5 - D D Nyhan (1962, 1964, 1972, 1973, 1974)
• 4 - Mark Purdon (1988, 1995, 2003, 2008)
• 4 - M F Holmes (1934, 1952, 1957, 1965)

Winners list

See also

References