view raw text
ALL CONCERNED VASTLY PLEASED. Hot Springs Meeting Smoothly Conducted and Satisfactory to Promoters and Patrons Alike. By J. L. Dempsey. Hot Springs, Ark.. April 1. — Only two more days remain of the local race meeting, and when the cnrtiin rings down on the sixth race at Oaklawn Park on next Tuesday afternoon the members of the Business Mens League of this city will have just cause to congratulate themselves, not only because they were highly successful in the restoration of racing in Hot Springs, but because of the excellent manner in which it was restored. The meeting has been a success in every way and things turned out just as the local business men were confident they would — it drew a high grade of people here from the north and east, which proved a big boon to financial interests. At the end of the local meeting there will be a scattering of horsemen and followers to all directions. The greater part of those who engaged in the racing here will go to Kentucky, but many will go to Tijuana, others will go to Baltimore and New York, while others will go direct to Canada. Regardless of where the horsemen go. they will all leave hero praising the local racing and the men who sponsored it and made it possible. The second increase in the purses which took effect last Tuesday seemed to have a tendency to bring out more horses and the fields were larger than during the first part of the meeting. The handicaps and races which called for the better grade of horses also filled better than early in the meeting and local race goers have been treated to some keen sport in the past week. Judge J. R. Campbell, who is also acting in the capacity of racing secretary, has given every class of horses an opportunity to win races here and the horsemen were not slow in realizing that. This has served to bring many cheap horses together, but in a majority of the races where the entrance price was at a low figure the hardest fought races of the meeting resulted. To Henry Schrader. track superintendent of Oaklawn Park, belongs a lot of credit for the excellent condition the plant is in at the present time. He has been in charge of the course since its construction twelve years ago and at no period during that time, even when it was idle, did he allow it to lapse into or show signs of decay. When the present meeting was first proposed and the track looked over, those behind the racing movement were surprised to find how well the plant had been kept up and when the meeting developed into a reality, it took only a short while to get things in readiness for the opening. Schrader is a man of much race track experience, having also been connected with the Harlem and Hawthorn courses in Chicago. It would be hard for u race track to get a better break in the weather than the local track received, as it rained only one day in the first seventeen and. following the rain, the course was in better order than ever. This was just what it needed and a few days after the rain Dr. Carmen equalled the mile record set by Pan Zareta on the opening day of the meeting — 1:39. Vampire, winner of a race here recently and which is now running in cheap selling races, was at one time considered one of the best two-year-olds by G. L. Blackford, the Texas breeder and owner, but after going wrong at Juarez and later meeting with a mishap at the Lexington, Ky., track, he was on the shelf for some time. He had a bad leg and he was nursed along carefully in the hope that he would show a flash of the form which he displayed in his early racing days in private, but Blackford finally disposed of him at New Orleans last winter. His ailment is now a thing of the past, but he is strictly a selling plater. At one time his owner refused a handsome offer for him. only to wind up by letting him go at a cheap price. The bidding up men were more active during the past week than in the first part of the meeting, but few horses changed hands in this manner. Rirka seems to be a target, as she won two races m the first seventeen days and was bid up both times. The claims put in for horses here have been few and far between and at no time here thus far has there been a real selling war on. Goodwood, which runs in the name of E. Rick-ett. is a wonderfully improved horse since coming here. He was claimed from R. F. Carman at New Orleans and since coming here he won three races. He has beaten some good selling platers here and has a terrific burst of speed in the stretch. In his first four starts third was the worst he finished, and that was in a sprint race.
