Here and There on the Turf: Another Great Match. How a Rule is Evaded. Maryland Meeting, Daily Racing Form, 1923-11-13

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Here and There on the Turf Another Great Match. How a Rule is Evaded. Maryland Meeting. Two-Year-Old Situation. And still there is another of the match racc3 that is assured. This is the meeting between Carl Wiedemanns In Memoriam, winner of the Latonia Championship Stakes from both Zev and My Own, and the Rancocas Stables three-year-old. These two colts will come together at Churchill Downs Saturday, and it will be a race that will either verify the running of the Latonia Championship or Zev will wipe out that defeat. As a matter of fact Zev ssems to have the better of In Memoriam in this newest match. The colts are to come together at a mile and a quarter, and it is a play or pay proposition. Zev has long since proved his mud running ability and, while In Memoriam has shown to best advantage over a fast track, it is hardly to be expected that ho will not be raced through muddy going rather than forfeit the 0,000 side wager that is a part of the match. Altogether that is a match that has something of a sporting flavor, for the parties to it are each putting up 0,000, which is an equal amount to the stake that is offered by the Kentucky Jockey Club. It is. coming back to the old idea where the sportsmen made the matches rather than wait for this or that association to offer inducements to bring horses together. In Memoriam was such an easy winner of the Latonia Championship that it is natural that Mr. Wiedemann should be firm in the belief that his sterling son of McGee is the master of Zev. Hildreth is just as confident that In Memoriam has beaten Zev for the last time. That i3 the spirit that brings about match races; it is the spirit that will always mean much to racing. The horse is the thing, and when there is the admiration for the horse there is sure to be a healthy turf. While on the subject of match races it might be said that there is a chance to overdo that sort of racing. Incidentally match races are contrary to the rules of racing, and they must always be known by soms other name. However, the rule has been evaded and these have been called specials. The most pronounced -evasion of the rub, of course, was the meeting of Harry F. Sinclairs Zev and Ben Irishs Papyrus at Belmont Park on October 20. That was a match in everything except the side wager that is usual in matches, but in all of the publicity it was carefully called the International race rather than the International match. It was a race in which only two horses were eligible, Papyrus and the three-year-old to be selected to run against him. In most of the matches that have been made sine: the enactment of the rule prohibiting matches there have been conditions framed that would look to the bringing together of two particular horses, but there was always conditions that did not bar all others. Under the rule of the Jockey Club this meeting between Zev and In Memoriam should be open to My Own or any other three-year-old whose owner was willing to accept the conditions and put up the 0,000 .to start that has been required. This will not be done, but it is readily, seen that in the epidemic of match races the rules have been forgotten, and it would be well to stop and consider before this goes much farther. There are real sporting matches that do racing good in the spirit they show, but when matches are put on merely for their drawing power at the gate, or merely for the money that is to be won, they are not altogether sporting matches. The real sporting match caa be made between any sportsmen without the aid of the purse from a racing association, and they can readily be decided in the forenoon over any race course. With the Pimlico meeting of the Maryland Jcckey Club completed there only remains that at Marlboro and the meeting of the Southern Maryland Association to be conducted at Bowie." In the last two years Marlboro has enjoyed an altogether new importance for the reason that it has had open time, and it has come at a season when there are no end of first-clas horses available. Marlboro is sandwiched in between the closing of Pimlico and the opening of Bowie. Many of the big stables that raced at Pimlico will remain over for the sport at Bowie and not a few of them will keep some of their horses busy in the interim at Marlboro. Thus it is that the Marlboro dates are peculiarly fortunate. And Bowie continues to grow in importance. From its beginning Bowie has steadily grown in importance, and its meetings mean more and more every year. This year many of the larger racing establishments that usually went into retirement at the close of the Pimlico meeting will wait over for what is offered by James F. OHara and his associates at the Bowie racing ground. The old faithful will always bs there, but they will not find it as easy as it was a few years back to win races. Joseph McLennan, to make the racing attractive for these better-class horses, has framed a book that makes certain good contests. The running of the two divisions of the Walden at Pimlico Saturday did not make any material change in the two-year-old estimates of the year. While both races brought about good contests and it gave ecch winner Stan-wix and Senator Norris a new importance there need be no marked revision in the juvenile estimate for the year. Sarazen and Wise Counsellor still stand out prominently and with tha possibla exception of St. James the championship rests between the pair of them. As for Happy Thoughts, of course, she must not be let out of consideration. But she was so decisively beaten by Sarazen that for the time being at least she is eliminated. Of course, the track condition may have had much to do with the result of that meeting, but it is not likely that she will ever see the day that she can beat Mrs. Van-derbilts gelding over any sort of a track or any sort of a distance.


Persistent Link: https://drf.uky.edu/catalog/1920s/drf1923111301/drf1923111301_2_3
Local Identifier: drf1923111301_2_3
Library of Congress Record: https://lccn.loc.gov/unk82075800