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i ,.| ro£andand : ™*™ JUDGES STAND] "■— — — — — — — — By Charles Hatton Pavots Preeminence, Past or Permanent? Woolf Has Confidence in Unbeaten Colt Taxpayers Senior Partners in Tracks TRA Members Interested in Derby Result LOUISVILLE, Ky., June 5. While the Derby hopefuls are completing their preparation for Saturdays fabled mile and a quarter. New Yorkers will see Pavots coming-out party in tomorrows Withers mile at Belmont i ,.| Park. Park. Walter Walter Jeffords Jeffords colt colt was was invincible invincible Park. Park. Walter Walter Jeffords Jeffords colt colt was was invincible invincible among eastern two-year-olds last year, and there are any number of turf folk who are obsessed with a notion that ultimately he j will prove the champion again this season, I despite his absence from the important "Run . for the Roses. This interesting theory will j be tested within the next fortnight. Just before he boarded a train for Gotham, the noted "money rider" George Woolf remarked to us that he ". . has a date with Pavot in the Withers." adding that "if he runs all right right in in that that one one he he will will move move on on to to Balti- ™*™ right right in in that that one one he he will will move move on on to to Balti- Baltimore for the Preakness." It is possible that the question of c supremacy will be settled in the latter stake, as most of the I leading candidates for the Derby also are named for the Hilltop t classic. Woolf, incidentally, will have mounts in some 50,000 s v.orth of stakes during the next 10 days. Following the Withers t he returned to Derbytown to give Sea Swallow an assist in the I 5,000 Kentucky Derby at the end of the week, journeying back t across the Appalachians to Baltimore for the Preakness. Sea t Swallow was pretty limber, according to his pilot, when he be- t came involved in the traffic jam at the eighth pole in the Blue : 1 Grass, but he fancies Seabiscuits son will wear better in the i Derby if the going is firmer. The "4 question" in eastern racing circles just now is one o whether Pavot has the stamina to match his vaunted speed. "He seems to have been training well," Woolf observed, "and I think he may do at a distance. You know, he could be rated last season." The horse-wise little westerner added that Pavot so excelled his rivals that his capacity really never was tested as a two-year-old. Asked how the son of Case Ace compared with Occupation and other fleet youngsters he piloted, Woolf said that the Marsch stallion was "one of the fastest colts I ever rode, but I would not know how to compare them, for whenever I clucked to Pavot he could turn it on, too, and he has done everything that has been asked of him." In the Jeffords colts favor is his riders confidence that he is amenable to rating as well as being able to come out of the slips in high gear. Indeed, it is going to be interesting to note if he still can do these things better than others of his age. Before some obnoxious statistician uses reports of "tote" handles of tracks to a disadvantage — subtracting the sum "returned " to the public" from the total and emitting a blue-ribbon beef to the effect that the tracks keep all the remainer — it j. should be noted that most of them are in the highest tax bracket, to say nothing of overhead and distribution. It is perhaps worth mentioning also that the most successful New York club last year made 5 per cent, whereas the government allows businesses functioning [ " on a cost-plus basis 6 per cent A majority of tracks are, * In fact, so successful that when there was no racing some observers were unkind enough to hint that the more mercenary clubs did not care whether they opened, there was so little profit in it after deducting taxes that they might remain closed and make more money. Whether you think tracks make too little or too much, or make too little because they make too much, sight should not be lost of the salient fact that the state and federal j governments are, as Bryan Field says, the senior partners in the e business. Thus, the largest share of the "tote" handle that is not immediately "returned to the public" eventually is returned J +.o them in the form of schools, old-age pensions, highways, etc. " Mrs. W. G. Lewis intention of shipping Darby Dieppe from here to Suffolk gives the management of the Boston track a substantial "rooting interest" in this colts welfare in Saturdays "Rose Run." Probably Air Sailor will grace Detroit racing. Burning Dream, Jeep, Alexis and Hoop Jr. trek eastward, while Fighting Step, Foreign Agent and Pot o Luck head for Chicago. There is a possibility fc that Fighting Step will appear at Garden State Park and that Pot o Luck will move to Pimlico, if his form warrants. All of which gives TRA members good reason to be anxious about the Derbys result. Turfiana: Tom Graham of Detroit, who owns Bert G. and d Kenilworth Lad, two Canadian "dark horses" in the Derby, formerly owned Kenilworth Park race track. . . . Alexis mile and d a quarter Derby work in 2:0535 was an extraordinary work over «" the relatively dull Jamaica surface. . . . There is only one Case *e Ace two-year-old out of a Man o War mare this season— Mrs. s. Andy Schuttingers Deck Call. The Woods will be full of them m in 1948. . . . Bert G., who has started but once, is a Piatt-bred d son of Maedic, and is more notable for sheer size than anything ig else. . . . Al Sabath, whose string this year will be active in the ie Middle West in charge of Charles Zoeller, will himself spend id much of the season in Washington, D. C. His soldier son Dan n is in Belgium. . . . Wesley Roberts, one of the lads in New W . Guinea, has sent relatives at Shively, Ky., two rather mouldy ly five-dollar bills to bet on Burning Dream for him. . . . Pavots s Juvenile half-brother by Jamestown is called Lovat. . . . Bymea-bond l- is perhaps too "keyed up," just as Burning Dream proved ;d with blinkers added to his equipment. These will be removed, in In the hope that he will be more relaxed. . . . Free for All joins is Errard at Henry Knights Almahurst Farm for the year
