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Here and There on the Turf Should Change Belmont Track Futurity Belongs on Main Course Four Futurity Hopes Out Granville Will Seek 1937 Cup Joseph E. Widener, president of the Westchester Racing Association, will sit in his comfortable quarters atop the huge Belmont Parle grandstand Saturday and view the running of the Futurity, at six and one-half furlongs over the straight course named for him. With powerful glasses and from his fine point of vantage the Philadelphia sportsman will be able to see the race clearly and perhaps have the pleasure of witnessing his Optic in a victorious performance. Many thousand other persons will be at Belmont Park Saturday for the Futurity, but the t large percentage of them will watch the race m from the grandstand or the lawn and all W they will see will be a mass of horses com-f ing towards them and an ineffectual public address system informing them of the relative positions of the leaders. It will be great sport for the Westchester Racing Association president to watch the Futurity running, but the masses who paid their way into Belmont Park for the race will not have the same thrill. A dream Widener wishes to see realized is Belmont Park accommodating a capacity crowd which would be larger than any other track in America could care for. Arlington Park has more seats in its stand, but the Nassau plant has the standing room to more than make up for the difference. No track will ever have a chance for a gathering of fifty or sixty thousand persons, however, until the admission is lower and the mode of betting is more convenient, and that docs not necessarily mean a switch to the pari-mutuels. In the case of Belmont Park, it never will have the crowd to which it is entitled on big days such as Saturday until the important races are run over a track where Lhey may be plainly seen without benefit of binoculars. The Widener straightaway is all right for truly run contests, but the public would rather see a race like the Futurity offered on the main course, even though the circumference of that track Is so great as to place the back stretch an unusual distance away. Belmont Park would have every opportunity to attain the prestige as Americas greatest racing center if its tracks were relocated. The main course of a mile and one-half should be reduced in circumference at least to a mile and a quarter bringing the back stretch much closer to the grand stand. The Widener straight course could remain but its length should be reduced to five furlongs and used only for two-year-old events during the spring. During the autumn meeting when the distances for juvenile races are greater, these races should be staged on the main course for the benefit of the public if Continued on thitty-tecond pagej
