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SARATOGA TRACK SLOW THIS YEAR Change in Conditions Is Due to the Sandy Top DressingBest Horses Behind Their Usual Time. By Ed Cole. Saratoga, X. Y.. August 8. Handicappers, who use time as a basis for calculations, will find the .-Saratoga track much slower than it was last vear. -fP Tliis is probably due to the sandy top dressing. "Last year there was much rain and the management changed the condition of the going, anticipating rain this year, which so far has. not materialized to any extent. Trainers say the going is at least a second slower than last year and the racing has shown it. The best horses In training are falling much behind, their figures regarding time. Stromboli was all out to win a mile and an eighth in 1:54. Omar Khayyam stood a long drive to cover a mile and three-sixteenths in 2:01, and Papp was 1:14 covering three-Kiuarters. The track record for "tliree-duarters in 1:11, made by Punch Bowl, while Sir John Johnson and The Finn covered a mile" and three-sixteenths in 1:58. The record for the mile and an eighth is 1:51. Hence it will be seen that the track conditions have changed considerably. There is another Hem in connection with the running of the horses. Many of them have shown signs of leg weariness in the past week, especially in the closing strides of races. John Mayberry says that horses accustomed to the fast going like Empire City will pull themselves apart plowing through the going here. It. takes a good stout horse to line up to his form. Sun Briar quit as if shot in the United States Hotel Stakes last Saturday after showing phenomenal speed for five-eighths. This state of affa irs is liable to cause ciianges in form frequently. Horses that have shown well over the track are likely to repeat and beat horses that are their superior on a lightning fast track. Again, horses that have had a race or two over the sandy soil may improve as they get more accustomed to it. Consistency cannot be too minutely expected when such conditions prevail. Omar Khayyam Fancies Any Distance or Going. Since Omar Khayyam won the Kenner so impressively, some folk are changing their opinion on the question of supremacy between the Viau horse and Hourless. It will be an interesting contest if it ever takes place, and the question of favorite is in doubt, though it is generally conceded that at a mile Hourless would bo the choice. But over that distance Omar Khayyam would have the most admirers. That the latter is a good horse isT positive. He 5?.s a.likinK for any kind of going, or any distance: His disposition is superb. He is what can be well and truthfully termed "an old-fashioned horse." His trainer, Dick Carman, says he will do any thin" he is asked. . "Just a loafer arid a fooler thats what he is." says Carman. "He will hang around until voii call on him and then he picks his way through and goes to the front. He never worries about anything, and after heading a horse he is just as likely to run beside him for a while, as if in conversation. But just -shake him up and show him there is danger around him and he bursts off and is soon out of nil trouble. He seems to have supreme confidence in his nbility, and this gives him that indolent, dont-enre sort of disposition. In the stable he is like an old cow, and when shipping he simply gets into his stall and is comfortable in a minute. The strangest part of his disposition is the fact that he will work just as fast as he is asked to and all alone. Just cluck to him and he will run a quarter in 23 seconds and keep on at a rapid gait unless checked, let in races he likes to be surrounded by company. In my opinion Omar Khayyam is one of those wonderful horses one sees only in a generation."
