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Here and There on the Turf New Course for Futurity. Generosity of Pimlico.-Tom Welsh to Race His Own. Big Kentucky Fixtures. This question of a new straight course at Belmont Park before ths running of the next Futurity is of great interest just now and it seems better than possible that a change will be made at the big Nassau County course. The magnificent distances at this racing plant make possible almost any sort of -a course that could be desired and it would be easy of accomplishment to have the Futurity course cut diagonally through the infield from a point beyond the present training track and have it any desired length. Such a course would be similar tothe Eclipse course at old Morris Park, but -would be an infinitely more desirable racing gTound. The trouble with the straight course at Morris Park was that it was downhill practically all the way and it worked havoc on the legs of tho horses that raced over it. Trainers who raced at Morris Park can tell of many a good horse that was virtually ruined racing over the Eclipse course. They were ruined by reason of its being downhill and at a grade that put an unnatural strain on both bones and tendons. Belmont Park is laid out on a plain where it is not much of a problem to have an absolutely level course, as a matter of fact, a grade would have to be built if desired. The room is. there for any sort of a course and the work of construction would be a simple matter. This is the time for a decision to be reached in the matter and when that decision is reached there will remain ample time to build the course and have it seasoned and safe long before the running of the next Futurity. With the course coming across the field diagonally as suggested, it would afford those in the stands a view of the race that can never be obtained with the present course, white it would still remain a straight course. It would naturally be built of a width that could accommodate thirty or even forty starters, for even forty are possible when it is remembered that twenty-nine went to the post for the last running of the big race. The rules of racing require that there shall be five feet of room for each starter and there should be room in the stakes as well as in the overnight races. The size of fields may be regulated in overnight races and pruned down to the legal size for the particular starting point from which they are to be started, but a field in a stake race cannot be pruned down. No matter how many of the eligibles want to try for the race they must be accommodated. The stake is a contract agreement with the man making the entry and the association cannot deny him the chance to start unless there is some other reason other than the cumbersome size of the field. In 1922 the Maryland Jockey Club, because of the number of starters named for the Pim-lico Futurity, ran that rich event as two distinct races and added 0,000 to each. That was done to afford every starter a3 even a chance as was possible. The Maryland Jockey Club showed unprecedented generosity in thus dividing the race, but the same club had established its own precedent in 1918 when the Preakness Stakes was run in two divisions,, one-half going to War Cloud and the other to Jack Hare Jr. That was another occasion when the number of starters would have resulted in the race not being a truly run one, if an attempt was made to have them all started in one division. The way the five feet to a horse rule must be applied in stakes where the field is too cumbersome to afford that running room for all of the starters is to send them away in two lines. Each horse is entitled to five feet of room and the preference of the front line is governed by post positions. In a dash of seven-eighths to be started in a second line would be a handicap that hardly any horse could overcome, hence the imperative need for wide courses where the big stakes are decided. But all of this will naturally be taken care of if the new course is built. Major Belmont and his associates of the Westchester Racing Association, if it is decided to have a new course, will see to it that the size will be ample to take care of a field of any size. Tom Welsh promises to show his own silks on the race courses again, now that he has resigned from the post of trainer for Joseph E. Widener. Mr. Welsh has trained the Widener horses, both in this country and in France, for something like a dozen years and, while the name of his successor has not been made public, it is known that two or three available men are mentioned for the post. Tom Welsh has played an important part on the American turf in his long years of useful endeavor and before taking over the contract with Mr. Widener one of his most successful ventures was when he was a partner and trainer for the Newcastle Stable. Other partners in that strong racing confederacy were Blair Painter, Frank Bishop and Andrew Miller. One of the really good horses developed by Welsh at that time was McCarter, winner of the Saratoga Handicap of 1907 as a three-year-old, as well as of several other good races. It is the intention of this veteran trainer to race a few of his own and it is entirely pos-sibb that he will show his colors before the end- of tho present racing season. It is natural that there should be great racing interest in the doings of Pierre Werth-eimers Epinard, at least until he has completed the last of his three contract engagements, the mile and a quarter at Latonia on October 11. It is natural that trainers with eligibles to meet the Frenchman put great store in the honor that would go with a triumph over the invader, but in the meantime there are several that are not forgetting the other big offerings of the Kentucky Jockey Clubs Latonia meeting. The two races that are particularly attractive are the Latonia Championship Stakes and the Latonia Cup. It was in the Latonia Championship last year that In Memoriam triumphed over Zev, winner of the Kentucky Derby, while the Cup alscf saw a triumph for a Kentucky horse when Chacolet was home first in that gruelling two and a quarter miles gallop. The East has not forgotten those two defeats and there will be an invasion from New; York in an endeavor to bring back the trophies. V Y v
