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Here and There on the Turf Racing at Collinsville. Pettibockers Victory. Altavoods Campaign. There has come another announcement of racing plans for St. Louis for next year. This time it is a more definite announcement than any that have gone before. C. Bruce Head promises to have a race meeting at Collinsville, 111., which is adjacent to St. Louis, next May. The promise is there will be forty-five days of racing and it is asserted that the course will be ready in ample time to carry out the program. The track is said to have been built and the frames of the grandstand and the clubhouse are in position. This will make it readily possible to finish what is to be done through the winter and spring. For a considerable time there has been work going forward to bring racing back to St. Louis, but this Collinsville track is in Illinois and, while it may be looked upon as a St. Louis track, it does not depend upon the laws of Missouri for its success. The meetings that have been held at Hawthorne and Aurora have pretty thoroughly established the possibilities in the state of Illinois and there is a chance that this Collinsville venture may be a successful one. Time was when St. Louis was an important racing point, but the racing in St. Louis was overdone and then came the banishment of the thoroughbred. There is always a danger that the sport will be overdone again, and in the rush to open new courses this should ever be kept in mind. It is possible that St. Louis will have racing that will be a credit to the turf. There is ample room for St. Louis in the turf scheme and it should have racing, but it must be kept within bounds if it is to have lasting success. The victory of Mrs. H. Ackers Pettibocker at Pimlico Tuesday calls to mind a previous race of the daughter of Chicle and Pantalette. It was at the meeting of the Empire City Racing Association, and on that occasion jockey George Carroll, who later earned a suspension for rough riding, was guilty of what appeared a deliberate attempt to hide the form "of the filly. In that race Pettibocker was meeting the best two-year-olds at the meeting, the race having ben won by Marshall Fields Stimulus. Pettibocker ran away from Stimulus in the early running, and for no apparent reason, except to hide the speed of the filly, Carroll took her up, and she eventually finished last. It was a clumsy bit of work on the part of Carroll and it did not fool the observing horsemen. Her next race was her Tuesday victory. Too often jockeys endeavor to hide the form of their mounts, and usually it is done on orders, but it is unfair racing, and merits punishment. Horses that may not be considered entirely ready are started and run above the expected form; then the jockey, on occasions, has seen to it that the horse does not show the best of which it is capable. It would never do to win when not "intended." Horses must always be "intended." There is nothing wrong in starting a horse before he is considered right at this best. Many of them need the race to tighten them up for the one that is in view, but should the same horse in this tightening up show unexpected form, the jockey that does not permit it to run to its best is guilty of just as much fraud as the jockey that deliberately "pulls" a horss. There have been "qualifying" races run on many occasions, but there can be no place for the rider that will deliberately take up liis mount solely for the purpose of hiding fits real form. Altawood is going along well in his preparation for the invasion of Maryland. His first engagement was in the Pimlico Autumn Handicap, at a mile and a quarter, and he is also in the Bowie Handicap, at a mile and a half, and the Pimlico Cup at two miles and a quarter. The recent workout of a mile in 1:40 would indicate that Altawood is about ready, for what may be required of him. He has shown in Kentucky that he is a rare stayer, and these Pimlico engagements should be exactly to his liking. In both the Bowie Handicap and the Pimlico Cup there are many other good stayers, but at this writing Mr. Wideners good three-year-old seems to be the equal of any of them. It was not expected that Altawood would be sent to the post in the Pimlico Handicap, run Wednesday. All of his training suggested that he would be reserved for the longer stakes, and should he continue to go along as he has in the past he will be a hard horse to beat in both the Bowie Handicap and the Pimlico Cup.
