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I ■ , i BELMONT PARK RACING » Westchester Racing Associations Spring Meeting Begins Friday. — — i Beauty of Wonderful Track Immensely Enhanced by Recent Improvements Now Finished. ♦ NEW YORK. N. Y., May 16— Belmont Park, more attractive than ever with the many improvements and refining touches added since the gates closed last fall, will open for its spring meeting of twenty da 3 of racing on next Friday. The public has demonstrated at ttie current Jamaica meeting that the interest in thoroughbred racing never was so keen, nor so general, as it is this year and the enthusiasm will find an opportunity for full expres- sion in the most spacious race course in the country. Those who attended the successful meeting of the Inited Hunts Racing Association got an inkling how Belmont Park will look on Metropolitan Handicap Day. Joseph E. Widener. the new president of the Westchester Racing Association, and his associates, have spared neither money nor their own time and interest in the improvements of the course that might well be called the home of The Jockey Club. lf"is the intention of Mr. Widener to make P.cl-mont Park a park in fact as well as in name — and the most beautiful race course in the whole world. Even the parts of the grounds that the race-going public never sees have been included in the plans, which will make the plant second to none. Mr. Widener spent the best part of a morning at the course just before he left for Kentucky to attend the dispersal sale of the Nursery Stud, which has now passed into turf history, to make sure that all the loose ends would be cleaned up and all the paint dry and he left with the assurance that everything would be in readiness for Metropolitan Handicap Day. SOME OF THE IMPROVEMENTS. The concrete on the front of the grandstand and at th° upper end has been treated an.l painted till it looks like Caen stone ; new flower beds and shrubs have been set out and the walks covered with crushed stone and the grass and the hedges trimmed. The enclosure section under the grandstand, which came in for most attention this spring, has been transformed into what might be the palm room of a smart hotel for the unsightly iron pillars have been covered with red brick and trellises and the illusion accentuated by the tastefully arranged plants and climbing vines. A big jockey board, a duplicate of that at I.ongchamp.s, which Mr. Widener imported some weeks ago. is in place on the rear of the grandstand, facing the paddock, and the paddock itself is green and inviting with its new trees. The new administration building, the most beautiful architecturally and the most complete for the comfort of the jockeys, trainers and executive force, is ready for use. In front of it the public will see the weighing out. the boy sitting on the scales in the English way with his tack, the horses led In and the riders mount and go out on the truck. Superintendent H. I. Pels and a big force of workmen have been busy getting the grounds and the track in condition and thanks to hiss efforts both are the best they ever haw l . . ■; as proof, their efforts have met the approval of the trainers, who as a rule are severe critics. GREAT RACING IX PROSPECT. The racing, however, is bound to- interest the public most and there is every promise for the best sport of the sprintr se.ison. The t il les at li-lmont Park are full of good li rses, particularly two-year-., ids, which will make their first appearance of the season at this meeting. The Metropolitan Handicap. ,000 added, at one mile, the first of the three stakes for Continued on sixteenth pose. BELMONT PARK RACING fContlnacfl from first pai«. older horses, as has been the custom since it was first run at Morris Park in 1891, will be the feature of the program on the opening day. There will be an additional interest in the race this year, as the Westchester Racing Association has revived the custom of announcing the weights in February. The Metropolitan has furnished some of the most stirring contests in the annals of the turf and has been won by some great and many good horses, among them Tristan, Voter, Bowling Brook, Ethelbert, Banastar, Irish Iad, Sy-sonby, which ran a dead heat with Race King on the day Belmont Park was first opened; Jack Atkin, King James, Whisk Broom II., Stromboll, The Finn, Mad Hatter and Grey Dag. Sarazen, considered by many the best three-year-old last year, fresh from his triumphs in Maryland, where he set a track record at Havre de Grace and then won the Dixie Handicap, is almost a certain starter. He is top weight in the race under 12$ pounds. Dad kin, also one of the cracks of last year, may make his first appearance of the season and in his new colors, that of the Log Cabin Stable, in the Metropolitan. He will carry 126 pounds. Wise Counsellor also is a probable starter. Each one of these horses won one of the three International races last fall and a meeting in the Metropolitan Handicap on Friday would be one of the turf events of the year. PROSPECTIVE STARTERS. In addition to these, among the most likely to go to the post are Mad Play, brother of Mad Hatter, which won the race in 1921 and 1922 ; Aga Khan. Wilderness, Big Blaze, Spot Cash. Shuffle Along, Cherry Pie, Nellie Morse, Laurano, which won last year ; Serenader, Priscilla Ruley, Lucky Play, Candy Kid, Sting, winner of the Excelsior Handicap at Jamaica a week ago; Wild Aster, Silver Fox, Voltaic, Sunsini, Transmute and Turf Idol. The International Steeplechase, for four-year-olds and over at about 2 miles, will be the other feature of the card. Steepleehasing will be one of the features of the Belmont Park meeting, and the Charles L. Appleton Memorial Steeplechase, the first 0,000 jumping race of the season will bring out the best of the many good horses in training. OLD-ESTABLISHED JfVENILE STAKES. The Juvenile Stakes of ,000 at five-eighths mile, the oldest fixture in the East for two-year-olds, will be run on the second day of the meeting. This heritage from Jerome Park and Morris Park was first run in 1S74. One hundred and eighty-eight colts and Mlies have been nominated and the race should give New York racegoers their first glimpse of the good ones of the Eastern stables. Among these are eleven of the two-year-olds that the Log Cabin Stud bought from the estate of the late August Belmont. The Ladies* Handicap, for fillies and mares, three-year-olds and upward, at one mile, also will be the feature cf the Saturday program-Some interesting events still remain lo be decided on the Jamaica program. The Greenfield Claiming Stakes, ,000 added, for , two-year-olds, at five and a half furlongs, I will be the feature of Monday. The South-I hampton Handicap, ,500 added, for three-year-olds, at one mile and a sixteenth, will be run on Tuesday, and the Garden City claiming Stakes, ,000 added, at one mile land a sixteenth will be the feature of the | closing day of the meeting. It may be said in passing, that the present meeting, despite the unfavorable weather earlier in the month, has been one of the most successful in the history of the Metropolitan Jockey Club. «- .
