view raw text
t i I . , j 5 j j i ; j i 1 i : OVERDOING THE INSTRUCTION HABIT. Commenting on the tendency of the present-day trainer to overburden jockeys with riding instructions. Bill Porter, a well-known race-track character, used this picturesque language at Saratoga a day or two ago: "When they tell the poor kids to stay in by the rail here to avoid a siot where a market woman spilled a basket of eggs she was taking to Jimmie ltowes stable for breakfast, and to pull out there to avoid a muddy place, they git the poor kids bughouse. Fool instructions cause half the roasting jockeys come in for. "I like the way Bob Tucker and Billy Lakeland talk to their riders before races. If Tucker is running a fast horse that Is sonUHhing of a sucker, he tells his boy that his Only chance is to go to the front and stay there. If the horse Is game and ready. Tucker says he is fit and will run wherever and whenever he is asked to. "One day Billy Lakeland loaned Tony Hamilton to one of those fellows who take a jockey over in the comer and make a complicated speech to him before giving him a leg up. He got Tony so dippy the poor coon did not know whether he was afoot or horseback. Filially in desperation the trainer appealed to Lakeland. This is what Lakeland said: " Tony, do you see that hossV "Tony allowed that he did. " -Well, get away from the post the best you can and come right on home. "Tonys ebony face glowed almost white so great was his relief, and he won his race all the way."
