view raw text
NOT THE HARD WAY By SALVADOR The brilliant victories of Whirlaway in the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness were won in the spectacular manner that always makes the most striking impression upon racegoers racegoersIn In both he came from far behind and ran his field down in covering little more than a quarter of a mile in each case the fourth quarter of the first mile j jThis This he did so smashingly that as he rounded into the home stretch he came away from them almost literally as if they were tied and squandered them through the last furlongs making them look like haltermens horses that in some strange way had got into the classics classicsAs As stated this manner of racing always sweeps the spectators off their feet For that matter it does the same thing to many of the regulars They too are thrilled and exhilarated and proclaim the hero of the ex ¬ hibition one of the greatest of the great if not the greatest ever everThis This is easily understood understoodIt It is the dramatic the sensational the theatrical the dashing flashing flaming blazing style of racing that invariably pro ¬ duces the largest and the most quivering thrills and causes the pulse xto leap and the gooseflesh to rise upon the cuticle cuticleCOUP COUP DE THEATRE THEATREIn In facing such displays as those men ¬ tioned resemble nothing so much as the coup de theatre by whjch the clever play ¬ wright and experienced stage manager get out the S R O sign and turn em away They make for scare heads on the sports pages and unleashed vocabularies on the parts of the reporters that fill them themBut But be it said that is not the hard way of winning winningNeither Neither is it the one which necessarily approves a thoroughbred as of the highest class classNo No it is not the hard way The hard way is a very different one as the veteran turf ¬ ite well knows knowsTo To stage such an act as that so glitter ingly put on at Churchill Downs and Pimlico by Whirlaway something more is needed than just the capacity to make a spectacular finish run There must also be a field of horses out front through the early running that will fold up when the star actor comes from behind and be incapable of real resistance resistanceThe The Kentucky Derby and Preakness fields were of that type as the writer has pre ¬ viously pointed out in DAILY RACING FORM When the son of Blenheim got ready to take over he did so without a struggle The pacemakers surrendered as if they were steeds of papiermache instead of the best blood supposedly that the breed can boast boastIn In considering the case one who can look back that far is much reminded of the un forgotten swayback Tenny who fifty years ago was the most spectacular thor ¬ oughbred before the public publicHe He was not like Whirlaway a colt that was given to swerving so much as he was to actually bolting while often he would simply sulk and refuse to run until the humor struck him when he would display such terrific bursts of speed that they dazzled everybody producing the impression that nothing else that wore hair was able to compete with him himWhen When however he tied up with Salvator there was a different tale to tell Then he found that when he came with his belated rush which was constantly compared to that of a cyclone or tornado he was up against a horse that did not know what the word surrender meant Instead he kept right on And before he was through with him he had broken Tennys heart heartTHE THE HARD WAY WAYThe The hard way as the veterans know is not that of the sensational rush from behind by a horse that has been restrained while the others are wearing each other out in the early furlongs but that of the horse that goes out in front sets his own pace and wins from end to end standing off all at ¬ tacks and living out the distance and the clip to triumph over everything everythingThat That is the real the supreme test of the supreme race horse horseIt It is rarely that there appears one capable of fulfilling it But when he does he leaves no doubt of his class of capacities capacitiesHe He does not as a rule do his work in the heady whirlwind lifting surging pulse thrilling fashion of a Tenny or a Whirlaway Not unless he is a St Simon a Luke Black ¬ burn or a Man o War who from the mo ¬ ment the flag falls leaves behind him in his meteoric flight the others Staggering and dying in his wake unable for an instant to withstand him Instead he battles all the way and at the end when perhaps some bottledup Tenny or Whirlaway is turned loose refuses to be beaten and the last minute challenger it outraced like all the rest restSuch Such an exhibition does riot have the elec ¬ tric thrill of the belated charge from the rear that makes the leaders look as if they had stuck their toes into the track and anchored themselves when the oncoming speed marvel gives them the works but to the connoisseur of racing it provides an exposition of everything that a real king of the turf must have to be one
