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Charles Hatton THE JUDGES STAND By Charles Hatton Count Injury Is Not Serious His Value to U S Bloodstock NEW YORK N Y June 7 7Count Count Fleet won thousands more converts to the CFIW Clubs premise he is the runningest horse that has come down the pike when jockey Johnny Longden restrained him a mile and a half in 228 to capture the Belmont Stakes by an emphatic 25 lengths or so at odds of approximately 1100 The weight of public opinion was terrific indeed costing the Westchester Association 15000 to pay the legal 120 minimum As everyone is of course aware of by now The Count established a new Belmont Stakes record and was within threefifths of the American mark despite Public Comes First Swope Mrs Ames Cocopet to Meet Longdens efforts to the contrary and became the first horse to sweep through the Wood Derby Preakness Withers and Belmont each of which he won on the chinstrap from flag fall to finish If this all seems a bit immoderate do not blame us The Counts per ¬ formances are so suffused with heroics the most un ¬ adorned resume inevitably sounds like an explosion of superlatives superlativesThe The American turf is fortunate in that Quickly foaled Count Fleet concurrently with the Axis conception of its horrendous scheme for world domination He provides a sportsloving populace a surefire antidote We think the racegoing public may rejoice too such thorough ¬ going sportsmen as Mr and Mrs Hertz own him himOnly Only The Counts immediate connections knew how really sensational was his exhibition of specd inleash in the Belmont until Sunday The colt Avrencne Avrencneback back stretch The injured member filled but he was not lame and neither I the tendons nor ankle joints are affected Trainer Don Cameron and his aide de camp Charley Hewitt are administering the injury Normalcy is expected to be restored in the ankle by the time you read this thisPerhaps Perhaps it sounds flagrantly farfetched but in the final anlysis the war may be responsible for this latest misadventure The Count has accepted You see Belmont Park comprises so many outsize strips that in conforming to a self imposed program of gas conservation the Westchester Association cannot water and manicure its sundry courses as in seasons past Saturdays surface was deep in dust perhap a second slow to the mile actually and of somewhat uneven texture textureUltimately Ultimately The Count is going to catch a really pasteboard surface or someone is going to rub saddle soap on Longdens reins then editor Dan Lyons will have to rewrite that invaluable tome The American Racing Manual ManualBarring Barring the intervention of a particularly unkind fate Mrs Hertzs colt will appear next in the Arlington Classic July 24 at Washington Park and the American Derby on August 28 at the same popular Chicago park There is an element of wishful fulfillment in this for Ben Lindheimer who long has been among the avid members of the CFIW Club and has hoped fondly for months The Count would lend enchantment to this brace of 550000 annuals annualsOcean Ocean Wave and Occupation at the moment are regarded perhaps optimistically as prospective rivals for these Illinois classics Enough enthu ¬ siasm may be generated for this duo to avert minus pools poolsCount Count Fleets connections are not averse to pitting him against the older runners at the proper time September or thereafter making sensible provisos as to his health and condition conditionThe The importance of this phenomenon of the Stoner Creek to American blood ¬ stock breeding is inestimable Years ago7 the Hertz hit happily upon a formula of developing here the strain of Englands gray spotted wonder The Tetrarch of whom this descendent Count Fleet may be called the American counterpart Quickly the recordbreaking mare who produced The Count and whom he resembles in his racy contour and impetuous mannerisms carries two infusions of this gray strain Valenciennes Seven Veils Anita Peabody French Duchess Gray Duchess and other Hertz mares also represent the line or did Anita Peabody being dead There are now at Stoner Creek five Haste mares who are agencies of from one to three crosses of the strain not to mention the mare Tickle by Sickle from a daughter of Stefan the Great and Vesper Bells who is by Stefan StefanThe The Hertzes and trainer Don Cameron have developed and are racing Count Fleet in a fashion that is refreshingly unmercenary He shall be retired without any unsightly scars of the firing iron to mar the clean symmetry of his underpinning These and his wellformed feet seem to this inexpert connoisseur io be his salient physical attributes John Hertz is a stickler for good feet having learned by experience imperfections in horses hoofs are more readily transmissible than defects in any other physical characteristics characteristicsArtists Artists who paint The Count would make a grievous error we think to accentuate his topline as is artists universal custom when the lower extremities are so infinitely more important and are so acceptable in The Counts instance Convenience to the public will be of prime consideration we are advised by commissioner Swope when it comes to determining finally the locale of Saratogas dispossessed meeting Nothing definite possibly can be written on this redhot subject until Aqueducts meeting has progressed far enough along its 18day course to permit a reasonably accurate comparison with public response to Belmont Parks successful spring meeting Most precocious of the effete Easts kindergarteners thus far in the 1943 turf season are the fillies Mrs Ames and Cocopet the former unbeaten in two stakes starts the latter in three overnights Each is an unqualified bargain of the 42 yearling auctions Mrs Ames at 2300 Cocopet 900 Mrs Ames who performs for restaurateur Harry Lustig has captured the Fashion and National Stallion Cocopet ran the fastest five furlongs clocked on Bclmonts AVidener chute this spring This has created interest in Aqueducts 55000 Astoria June 16 The lapse in winter racing of juveniles in Florida and the coughing epidemic on Long Island may have retroactive benefits say those who oppose early competition among juveniles juvenilesOn On this topic Frances commissaire Hennessey states Twoyearolds can only run in selling races until June in France which in my opinion tends to make our threeyearolds of better constitution and class
