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, ... ..,.■■ -, ■■■ • How to Train Horses • i By JULIUS BAUER. * - ■■ - 4 ARTICLE IX. . One of the most remarkable experiences of my long career in training came in connection with a mare I owned and raced named Sis OLee. In a previous article I spoke of pre-race preparation for horses, such as muzzling them after giving them their morning and noon meals and cutting down on water. This mare, Sis OLee, was psychic, as she proved to me time after time. She was a very light eater, being a delicate sort of animal, but after I had determined the amount of food she required, she usually cleaned it up or left very little of it in her feed box. On the days when she was slated to race however, she began to fast. I had muzzled her at first after her meals, but soon found out that such precautions were unnecessary. The moment I put the muzzle on her after her morning feed on race days, she lost all interest in food and refused even to munch hay. After a few months of these "hunger strikes," I determined that in the future I would continue my of fday routine with her, hoping thereby to fool her and tempt her to clean up her morning rations and her half-rations at noon. It was then that Sis OLee began to display her psychic powers. Despite the fact that I made every effort to appear unconcerned with her welfare on days when she was to race, she began to refuse even the morning meal. I let it "remain in the feed box, but Sis OLee, would have none of it. "PSYCHIC" MARE. How the mare learned that she was to race on the days when I had named her remains a mystery to me to this day. Every day in the week when she was In training she was given exercise work or breezes and on her race days I did not vary the program. Practically ignoring her and treating her exactly the same as any other morning, she still refused to eat on any day when scheduled to run. The mare was and is still the greatest mystery of my life. How did she know she was to race? Leaving Sis OLee and her occult powers for others to figure out, we can move along to another mare I had named Reina. She was a great filly, the first to ever win the Brooklyn Handicap. Only one other mare was good enough to duplicate her feat, Tokalon scoring five years later. In previous articles I mentioned that I liked to work all my horses over distances farther than they were asked to race. Reina, before the Brooklyn of 1902, was galloped twice over one mile and a half prior to the handicap, which at that time was one mile and a quarter. She took the measure of the best handicap horses of her day, carrying 104 pounds and beating Advance Guard, Pentecost, Blues, Alcedo, Watercure and others, time 2:07. The race was run in those days at Gravesend. GOOD WAGER. I had fifty dollars on Reina that day at 60 to 1. She opened at 100 to 1, but they backed her down to 50 right after I had placed my bet. I had a lot of confidence in Reina and thought she was well covered up. The players, however, jumped on her late, but heavily, and it was a good thing post time was so near. One horse in the race that I feared was Advance Guard. The result confirmed my fears, for Advance Guard took up the challenge when Monograph laid it down, had Reina beaten at the eighth post but failed to hold his advantage. The filly came again and dropped her head down on the wire in one of the greatest Brooklyn Handicap renewals I ever saw. Reina was a "bulldog." By that I mean she had more courage than any horse, male or female, I ever saw. Monograph had run with her head and head for the first three-quarters, than gave way to Advance Guard and he kept the miss under pressure to the finish. As long as we are cleaning up odds and ends here, Id like to state that only once in my long career was I approached and asked outright to "fix" a race. He happened to be a foreigner and he owned a horse entered in the same race with mine at Washington Park. This was the old Washington Park track at 63rd and Cottage Grove Avenue, in Chicago: The Limey wanted to "shoo" in his horse. He propositioned every other owner in the race before he got around to me. It so happened that I had a "green" boy up that I was attempting to make a rider. Probably for this reason he sought me out last of all. MUST WIN. My answer to him was that he could stage the "boat race" for all of me, except that my horse had to win. That may sound as if I was entering into the spirit of the thing, but as a matter of fact it was the surest way to indicate to him that I would have nothing to do with crooked schemes. He threw up his arms and said: "Theyre all willing to deal, but every man wants his horse to win." The other owners thought exactly as I did. They knew the foreigner would never stand for such a deal. You cant beat racing the crooked way. Ive seen the smart owners inevitably become enmeshed in the clutches of the law. They got away with it for a while, but eventually the officials caught up with them. Reverting once more to the subject of fillies and mares, I can honestly .say that at no period of the year did I ever have trouble in training or winning with them. You will hear others say that a filly or mare isnt worth bothering with in the spring. Of course I never did anything with the weaker sex in the way of racing them until May. This may account for my success, also the possible fact that I am what they call a "soft" trainer. That may sound contradictory in the face of what I did with Reina, but I have never been hard upon horses unless the exigencies of the occasion demanded it. Reina required that sort of work and she got it. You must vary your training program to suit the individual horse and Reina needed that sort of a preparation. The trainer who lays down a "hard and fast" set of rules and then sticks to them will never be a success.
