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FLAGS SOON UP AT JAMAICA » Three Weeks from Wednesday New York Racing Begins. ♦ Training Operations in Fall Swing Now — 3Iuch Interest Being Manifested in Rig Spring Fixtures. ♦ XEW YORK. X. Y.. April 7.— Three weeks from Wednesday next the flags will be flying over the stand and clubhouse at Jamaica, and the racing season on the courses under the jurisdiction of the Jockey Club in this state will be under way. In no previous year that can be recalled did the sport offer greater promise, as the stake fixtures offered by the various associations have filled abundantly. There is plenty of quality in the events for three-year-olds and those for thoroughbreds of this age and older, practically every one of the favorites of 1922 being on hand for this years campaign. In the matter of juveniles if good looks, breeding and private trials count fcr anything the same standard of excellence will prevail in the stakes for two-year-olds as in the features for older horses. With the spring season so near at hand horses are being sent along in earnest and trainers who were lured into the belief that winter had really taken its departure three weeks ago and shaped their training programs accordingly have recovered their accustomed equanimity and are eager for the day when they will be saddling their charges for the real tests of racing which answer more questions in the way of speed and stamina than a hundred private trials. Interest is now focused on the big events of the spring. Those for three-year-olds, beginning with the Stuyvesant Handicap at Jamaica and continuing through the Withers and Belmont Stakes at IJelmont Park ; the Dwyer Stakes at Aqueduct and the Empire City Derby at Yonkers have an open quality that will make for the keenest sort of interest and help to establish form by the time Saratoga is reached, where the best of the West will be on hand for the Travers, Miller and other fine races that will be decided there during August. BELMONT STAKES OF 0,000. Chief of these spring races for three-year-olds is the Belmont, which, because of its searching qualities — the conditions call for a test over a course of a mile and three-eighths — means so much to the breeding industry. Aside from its having a guaranteed cash value of 0,000 the fine old stake, which was inaugurated in 18G7, has a warm place in the affections of turfmen everywhere, who realize what the maintenance of such stake fixtures on a racing program season after season means. They are the guarantee which encourages investment and sustains enthusiasm in the bloodstock industry. That many of the best three-year-olds of the year are among the nominations for the big handicaps like the Excelsior, which will be the most important of races for older horses at Jamaica; the Metropolitan and Suburban at Belmont Park, and the Brooklyn and Brookdale at Aqueduct, is a good omen. Their participation in these races give them a much more open quality. Should a three-year-old capable of taking the measure of Exterminator, Lucky Hour, Grey 1-ag. Kai-Sang, Bunting and others of the ilk appear, the public, which is ever on the watch for new stars in the racing firmament, will have a fresh idol to worship for a period. lAUMONOK OPENING FEATURE. It has been definitely decided by secretary W. C. Edwards of the Metropolitan Jockey Club to offer the Paumonok Handicap as the chief attraction for Wednesday, May 2. This is one of the short-distance features of the season and has never furnished anything but a hard-fought contest. It has been won in the past by Tryster victor in 1922, On VVatch, Dunboyne, Flugs, Old Koenig, S;ind-marsh. Coquette and other fleet ones, some of which will go to the post again this year, Tryster and Dunboyne being looked upon as certain starters. The Kings County Handicap, with $:5,.r 00 added, and the Colorado Stakes of a guaranteed value of 1923.sh,000, will be run on the first Saturday of the Jamaica meeting; while Saturday, the 12th inst., will be a gala occasion with the Excelsior Handicap, at a mile and a sixteenth and a value of ,500. and the Youthful Stakes, of a guaranteed value of ,500, as the features of the card. Included in tlu fifty nominations for the Excelsior are such cracks of the older division as Grey Lag. Kai-Sang, Hunting, Lucky-Hour, Mad Hatter. Snob II., Thunderclap. Prince James, Pillory, Tryster and Firebrand, while the galaxy of three-year-old talent headed by Enchantment, Zev, Bud Lerner, Cherry Pie and Rialto, is most formidable. A thoroughly representative field should come from the above, along with such useful material as is embraced in eligibles like Emotion, Nedna, apt. A.cock, Devastation, Serenader, Paul Jones, Hephaistos, Best Ial, Knobbie, Flying Cloud, Brainstorm, Southern Cros-s, Olympus, Exodus, Batter-sea and Purity.
