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I FAMOUS AMERICAN RACES Great Contests of Speed and Endurance Between Champions of Their Year Recalled. The special races between champion horses about equally matched attract wide attention at any time and a halo seems to enshrine the competitors in these famous events so that they stand out in turf history and circumstances recalled and the merits discussed whenever a race is on the program bringing together the champions of the year, as was the case recently in the great race between Hourless and Omar Khayyam and later Man o War and Sir Barton. Racing of this character creates enthusiasm, stimulates breeding, promotes racing and is good for the business in all departments. There are always those eager to proclaim the latest sensational winner as the greatest horse that ever trod on the turf, unmindful cf the fact that the same thing occurs every year. Each year must produce its champion and, as to comparing the best horses of one decade with those of another, it is useless and impossible. Each fills its own niche in turf history. To own the best horse of the time in which it races is honor enough and a position only one can occupy each year. The races of Norfolk and Kentucky were as sensational as those of any three-year-olds we have ever had since. Norfolk was never defeated and Kentucky only beaten once and then by Norfolk, Kentucky subsequently selling for 0,000, the record price at that time for a race horse in this country- The race between Domino and Henry of Navarre will always be remembered as one of the most interesting and spectacular events- that ever occurred upon the American turf, resulting in a dead heat. GAMEIfESS OF RILEY GBAXNAJf. This race is also remembered for the gameness displayed by the late Riley Gran-nan in taking all of the money offered on Domino, about 0,000, at 3 to 5, and holding Henry of Navarre out, eventually cleaning up about 0,000 on a dead heat. Races that bring together the great horses are always popular and the public is ever ready to respond. A presidential campaign did not create as much excitement over the country in 1872 as did the contests between Longfellow and Harry Bassett in the Monmouth and Saratoga Cups, Longfellow winning the Monmouth and Harry Bassett the Saratoga. The race between Freeland and Miss Woodford is also recalled, when Mike Dwyer lost a kings ransom upon the defeat of Miss Woodford by Ed Corrigans mighty gelding. Salvator and Tenny are another great pair that battled for the supremacy when, if Tenny had not sulked, the verdict might have been different. Ethelbert and Imp have the distinction of running the Cup distance faster than it was ever run before or since. The record made by Ethelbert that day 1900 still stands, two and one-quarter miles in 3 :49, with Imp only beaten a neck, breaking every known American record for all distances I after the mile and a half had been passed. In this race the two horses raced like a. team, lapped upon each other all of the way, Continued on seventh page. FAMOUS AMERICAN RACES Continued from second puse. valiantly contesting every inch of the ground. First one and then the other would show a neck in front. A blanket would have covered them from start to finish, and as no subsequent winner of any two and one-quarter miles has ever approached that record it must be n sarded for speed and enduance as one of the most desperate distance races ever run on this continent. In other races Imp defeated Ethelbert as often as he beat her, so honors were about even. It is noteworthy that Domino in his racing career ran in a number of these sensational races ; ran a dead heat in two of them. In his two-year-old form, in a match race with Dobbins, owned by the Tammany chief, Richard Croker, for 0,000 a side and ,500 added by the Coney Island Jockey Club, over the Futurity course, he ran a dead heat and the stake and bets were divided, as was the dead heat with Henry of Navarre in his three-year-old form. The race between Henry of Navarro three-year-old, Clifford four-year-old and Domino three-year-old, run at, Morris Park October 6, 1894, where the horses finished in the order named, one and one-eighth miles in 1:52!4. is the subject of numerous discussions, turf enthusiasts apparently forgetting that Clifford was one year older than these two great three-year-olds, and when they raced against the former that year it was in handicaps, or weight-for-age races.
