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CLARK INAUGURAL HEADL1NER Old Handicap Is Stellar Feature of Downs Saturday Opening. Race Is as. Old as the Kentucky Derby-Good Field Assured for the Next Renewal of Race. LOUISVILLE, Ky., April 26.— Although the field that parades to the post for the Clark Handicap, the stakes feature on the inaugural program of the Churchill Downs spring meeting starting a week from today, will not include any of the few majordomos of the handicap division, it will embrace a number of the better older horses quartered in Kentucky, as the mile and a sixteenth contest should prove worthy of the fixtures long and meritorious history. This Downs feature is as old as the Kentucky Derby and Saturdays running will be its sixty-fifth. It has been won by a number of outstanding horses, and last year went to Main Man. From 1875 to 1S01, it was run as the Clark Stakes, and it was changed to a handicap for three-year-olds and older horses in 1902, a status it has held ever since. The Clark has been run at varying distances up to two miles, but since 1925 the route has been a mile and a sixteenth. Some of the horses that may be found contesting next Saturdays renewal of the race are Tiger, Military, Burning Star, Last Message, Arabs Arrow, Torchy, Co-Sport, Buttermilk, Bernard F. Poona, Ridge, Dnieper, Palamede and Sortie Star. As the plans for some additional eligibles have not been publicly announced it is possible that several others may be added to the field. Secretary and handicapper Willia:.- H. Shelley will draw up weight assignments for the race and his list of imposts will be announced here Monday.
