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Here and There on the Turf End of the Season. Stimulus for Pimlico. Offenses of Jockey Carroll. Added Money for 1925. It was the United Hunts Racing Association that gave the New Yorkers the first 1924 glimpse of thoroughbreds in action at Belmont Park on April 26. This was followed by another afternoon of racing on April 28. That was the curtain raiser and the Jockey Club racing began at Jamaica on April 29. With the running of the last race at the Yonkers course of the Empire City Racing .As- sociation on Thursday, the Jockey Club racing season came to a close, but as the United Hunts opened the sport in the spring, so it will close it in the falL There will be racing at Belmont Park, by this popular association, Saturday and a second day on Tuesday, elec- tion day. Counting the four days taken up by the United Hunts racing the New Yorkers will have had 162 days of practically continuous racing. But it was the close of the Yonkers meeting that brought to an end the racing over the Jockey Club circuit and it was a fitting close to a truly remarkable racing season. The coming of Epinard will make the racing of 1924 long remembered and there have been many other bright spots in the popular sport from the opening to the October closing. It has been pretty thoroughly demonstrated that Sarazen stands at the top of the class. He has surely proved his championship over all three-year-olds and there does not appear to be an older horse capable of giving him a serious argument. As a matter of fact the older divisions were not up to some former years, but the three-year-olds have done enough to stamp them as a good crop. As far as the two-year-olds are concerned, there is some doubt as to the actual champion. It will take the racing in Kentucky and Maryland to settle that, if it is to be settled definitely. The big race that remains for the two-year-olds afford opportunities for a selection of the best. It is devoutly to be hoped that the contenders for the crown meat, either in Kentucky or at Pimlico, so some definite conclusion may be reached. Marshall Fields Stimulus, the fast-running son of Ultimus and Hurakan, by Uncle, may have much to say in the decision of the two-year-olds championship before he is through with his fall campaign. There has been no more consistent two-year-old and his recent performances would suggest that George Odom has him at the top of his form." He has been the winner of his last three races and in each he gave every evidence of championship class. He is well engaged both in Maryland and Kentucky, but his particular goal at this time is the Pimlico Futurity mile, to which the Maryland Jockey Club adds 0,000. This race is to be decided over the Baltimore course on November 7 and there is no two-year-old stake that can boast of a more notable list of nominations. Odom has not asked Stimulus to race a mile, but he has worked him well enough over the route to be convinced that the distance is within his powers. He is a colt of extreme speed and, as far as he has been asked to run, he has maintained that speed to suggest that he had never reached the limit of his endurance. c 6 7 , 1 2 3 4 j 5 , 6 1 2 3 ! , , , , . 1 Stimulus has been started thirteen times and he has been the winner of eight races. His first start was on May 6 at Jamaica and he was returned the winner. He was beaten in his next race, but followed that with a victory. Then came the Hopeful Stakes, in which he had scant chance. He was beaten in his next race at Belmont Park and he followed that with a close second to Mother Goose in the running of the Futurity. Then came three victories in a row. They were followed by another defeat and his present winning streak has seen him three times a winner. In his campaign it has been demonstrated that Stimulus suffers a severe handicap when the track is other than fast. That may cost him the championship, but under fast track conditions he appears to have just as much chance as any other two-year-old to be crowned the 1924 king of the division. It is probable that George Carroll will have some trouble about wiping but his offense at the Empire City track Wednesday, when he was convicted of having grabbed the saddle cloth of Sandy Hatch in the stretch drive. His action brought about the disqualification of Deputy, and the ruling was an eminently just one, but with it went the suspension of Carroll, and it is a suspension that may last for a long time. In the previous race Carroll had been guilty of a peculiar ride on Mrs. H. Ackers Petti-becker, and, even if he had not offended in the following race, his riding of the son of Chicle and Pantalctte merits an investigation. Pettibccker had shown a wonderful burst, of speed, in front of as fast a colt as Stimulus, when, for no apparent reason, Carroll was seen to take him up shortly, and though the colt finished the distance out gamely, he was last of the field, when it seemed he had every chance to share in the purse. It is not intimated that Pcttibocker could have beaten Stimulus, but it is seemingly a sure thing that had Carroll employed the same energy as he did in his Deputy ride, even without the fouling, he would have been much closer to the winner at the finish. Too often, at the tail end of a racing season, some jockeys are prone to play fast and loose with the rules of racing, and the stewards at such meetings have a particularly arduous task to keep them in line. There has always been a disposition on the part of the gentlemen who serve at the Yonkers track, to strictly enforce the rules, and for that reason the future, at this time, does not appear rosy for Carroll. With the Kentucky Jockey Club Stakes at Churchill Downs, and the Manor Handicap at Laurel, both down for decision on Saturday, it is a big day for the two-year-olds. Both of these mile races have tremendous importance, and each is sure to result in a great contest. It is the closing day of a tremendously successful meeting at Laurel, and never in the history of that popular Maryland racing ground has there been a like attendance. The racing has been blessed with fair weather this year, and its character has been on a high plane right through the long racing season. Monday the Maryland scene shifts to the Pimlico course of the Maryland Jockey Club, and already many of the thoroughbreds that will take part in that meeting are on the ground. Many big things of the turf are still to be decided and in both Maryland and Kentucky the devotees of the sport have much in store during November. The close of the New York racing season will result in many of the New Yorkers finishing at one or the other of these racing grounds, and before the last word is written of the 1924 campaign there will be glorious races decided. With the Northern racing coming to a close there are already harbingers of the 1925 features. The Westchester Racing Association will shortly invite nominations for its Belmont Park Stakes and, when they are announced, it will be found that each will be an added money stake. There has been a coming away from the guaranteed values system that will be popular with the horsemen and there is much that will interest in this announcement when it is shortly .to be made. The Westchester Racing Association is always first of the New York associations to make known its plans for the .following year and this year the announcement tells of new prosperity on the turf that is .reflected in the added sums that will be offered.
