view raw text
MAY TRANSFER HUNTS MEET West Hills, Instead of Aqueduct, Now Proposed as Site. June 11, Is New Date Desired and It Would Conflict With Queens Racing Plan Doesnt Affect Fall Program. NEW YORK, N. Y., Jan. 12 The United Hunts Racing Association is planning a change of policy for its spring meeting this year. Instead of conducting a one-day "mixed" meeting at Aqueduct Friday, April 15, the date allotted by The Jockey Club, the organization is considering holding a straight hunt meeting of one day Saturday, June 11, at West Hills, L. I. Application has been made to the hunts committee of the National Steeplechase and Hunt Association for this date, which, it is understood, will be granted. The new date falls during the summer meeting of the Queens County Jockey Club at Aqueduct. No change is contemplated in the plans for the two-day fall meeting of the United Hunts Association, scheduled for Saturday, November 5, and Tuesday, November 8, at Belmont Park. Completion of plans for the proposed meeting at West JHills is dependent upon obtaining permission of Henry L, Stimson, secretary of state, to race over his property. Part of the West Hills Racing Associations course is on the property of Thomas F. White and part on the Stimson estate. It is planned to stage five races two open steeplechases, two steeplechases for registered hunters, with amateur riders, and one flat race for steeplechasers and hunters, amateur riders. The West Hills flat race and brush courses are entirely on the White property, but part of the three and a half miles timber course for hunters is on the adjacent estate. If the United Hunts spring meeting is transferred to West Hills, the Initial Handicap, the six-furlong sprint for three-year-olds and over, will be abandoned, nomination fees, of course, being returned to the subscribers. The United Hunts Racing Association believes that despite the conflict with the racing at Aqueduct, a meeting on Saturday in mid-June would be more successful in both a sporting and financial way than on the scheduled Friday date in April. It could be conducted more economically at West Hills than at Aqueduct, and interest in the amateur sport would be greater in June than in April.
