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Here and There on the Turf Winter Season Waning. Place of Off-Season Racing. Anomaly of Winter Stakes. Good and Bad Sport. The various race meetings are drawing to a close. Only a little over a month of racing remains to be completed before, the off-season courses will clos2 their gates. Thus far the winter courses have enjoyed more prosperity than usual, although adverse weather has been a severe handicap, at New Orleans particularly. Winter racing is of custom confined to horses of the cheaper grade with a few exceptions. It is not to the best interests of the turf that any other condition should prevail, but even winter racing attracts some horses of moderately high class. The racing at the Fair Grounds this winter has been of good quality. It is not difficult to find the reason for this,, either. The minimum purse at the Fair Grounds track is ,000 and this fact makes it worth while for an owner of a fairly high-class horse to take part in the racing. Instead of concentrating the money to be distributed into a few over endowed stake races, tha Business Mens Racing Association prefers to keep the general quality of the racing up by equalizing the opportunities for the various horses. There is a daily feature of slightly higher value which takes care of the better grade of horses and a few stake races, not too heavily endowed, attract good enough horses to make the Saturday and holiday racing interesting. The horsemen who race at the winter tracks are not interested in heavily endowed stakes. They are interested in daily opportunities to win purses which will assist to defray the expenses of thsir stable. Their chances to keep their establishments on a sound financial basis depend on the adequacy of these daily purses, because no trainer can expect to win every race in which he starts a hors3. At the Fair Grounds a winning race once a week will suffice to keep a smal stable going, but at the courses where first money h 00 or less, the horseman who has a small stable is not likely to finish tha long winter season without a deficit. These horsemen for the most part have little or no chance at th heavily endowed stake races of a winter meeting and the inadequacy of the daily purses is a heavy handicap to them. Winter racing is an important part of the turf scheme in these days whei there are so many inferior-horses which cannot earn their keep during the regular racing season. The function of winter racing is, primarily, to take care of these horses and their owners. An effort to ape the major tracks by offering heavily endowed stake races at a winter track will not improve the quality of the racing to any extent, even in these fixtures themselves and. by reducing the daily purses for the people endowing these events ths management sue cccds only in lowering the class of competition in the daily programs. The public will go to a race track to see a stake feature run, but if the other races on tha card of that particular day are cheap and weakly contested that fact will overshadow in the public mind any impression left by the stake race. A stake race attracts attention, not because it is a stake race, but because of the fame of the horses which face the starter. There have been many occasions when, because of track conditions or some other factor, a stake race which was intended as a featurs has lost all interest. On such an occasion an overnight race will overshadow the stake, because it attracts better horses and results in keener competition. The idea that a stake race, merely because it is a stake, will serve as ah irresistible attraction to the public is essentially faUe. The public knows better by this tini3 than to go io a race course with great expectations, simply because a stake race is to be run. The race goer will look over the entries and, if he finds a lot of selling platers entered in a stake race, he will know that he can expect nothing re markable in the way of sport. Winter stakes will frequently be .contested by selling platers, because few real stake horses are kept in training through the cold months for the people starting in one or two events. The racing of the regular season is altogether too valuable for a trainer to risk his chances at the summer prizes by keeping his stake horses in action through the winter. Racing during the regular season is conducted in or near the great population centers of the country. Ths public which supports the summer racing is sufficient in number to make the big races possible by their patronage of the courses. If the sport is not up to standard the fact is immediately reflected in the attendance figures. The winter tracks, on the other hand, have only a limited public. Their finances must be adjusted to local conditions and there is no way in which the daily patronage can be increased to any great extent. It is possible to lose a good proportion of the normal attendance by offering poor racing day after day. but it is not possible by any method to in- creaso the attendance beyond the distinct limits which the population of the community fixes. The Fair Grounds racing plan is undoubt cdly the nearest approach to an ideal winter arrangement possible at the present time The minimum purss provision gives every stable as nearly an equal chance at the money offered as is possible. The general quality of the racing is better than at other winter tracks because of this fact. Many horses arc kept in training there during the winter to race for ,000 purses which would be placed in winter quarters if no races of that value were offered. None of the horses, generally speaking, is of real summer stake quality, but there are a number which are certainly a little better than the average run of selling platers. Big stake races arc not needed to keep these horses in action and such races will never serve to attract horses of any better quality than these during a winter meeting.
