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JUDGES STAND I By Charles Hatton Ben Jones Hits Proposed III. Tote Tax Calif. Fans Rate Occupy Cup Favorite Arlington Stakes Lure Fleet Jet Pilot Paul Miller Promising N. Y. Apprentice In short: Assault is in both the Classic and American Derby here. . . . Colonel Bradley is very weak after his trip from Florida to Idle Hour. A committee of three now direct his affairs. . . . Miss Grillo, one of the rare few filly winners of the Argentine Derby, is training at Belmont. ... A Chicago medico, interested in Blue Phantasys plight, has been treating her for severe burns sustained in the Maine Chance blaze, and with some success. . . . The Ohio Thoroughbred Club, headed by Dr. Asbury, has joined the national organization of such clubs. . . . Bob Kleberg says he may one year breed Igual, dam of Assault, to Equestrian, sire of Stymie, as an experiment in inbreeding to his favorite horse. Eauiooise. . . . Mrs. Ann J. Lister, who is Ben F. Listers widow, will continue the estates bloodstock interests. Eternity, an ,000 weanling who has earned more than 0,000, heads the string. The sire Bull Brier, 19 broodmares, 14 yearlings and 12 foals are at Rhodes Estills place in Kentucky. Bull Brier is a brother to Eternal Bull. . . . Few horses race so well as Hampden on a trick knee. . . . Australians are writing Del Holeman, interestedly, about Four Freedoms, a "nephew" of Phar Lap, with a crop of foals in Tennessee. . . . Delaware Park adheres to the Maryland policy on bonuses, leaving it up to the owners. . . . Historian, winner of Lincolns La Salle, was once almost dead of a kind of strep throat and was saved by penicillin, which had not been used on horses to that time. Ben Jones views the proposed 4 per cent additional tote tax in Illinois with no less alarm than other racing men, saying that he "hopes nothing is done to spoil the splendid job Arlington has done to raise the standard of racing in Chicago. I feel very sure that an increase in take would be harmful to high class racing here. There would be a steady decline at the tote windows and this would start the game downhill, cutting into the profits of the tracks, which would have to decrease their purses and stakes." The Calumet forces are now assembled at the North Side park. Everywhere we go these days, we hear comparisons of Warren Wrights current champ, Armed, with his Whirlaway. On this subject Jones says: "I dont think Armed could beat Whirlaway. He may be smarter, but you could run Whirlaway every Saturday, and he would be a little better each time." West Coast turfgoers think the 5,000 Occupy "the one to beat" in the Hollywood Gold Cup. Sprinting was his game when John Marsch raced him in the Middle-West and in the East, but he has won at a mile and an eighth in California. They have a notion out there that he will get another three-sixteenths as a kind of reflex action. A native son with some sort of a chance in the Hollywood Cup is Holly Tree, who has not raced at the meeting, but won five straight at Santa Anita. He is by Hollyrood, was bred by G. T. Williams, is owned by Lou Bronstein, a wealthy Los Angeles ice cream manufacturer, and our spies assure us he is working briskly. Holly Tree has won at distances from seven furlongs to a mile and a sixteenth, running the latter route in 1:41%. Frenchy Pinons rags-to-riches mare, Happy Issue, will try to repeat in the Gold Cup. It is a little fanciful to think of a mare in foal beating the horses, but it would be quite a good story if she could bring it off. Meanwhile the meeting at Jack Mackenzies track is proving an unqualified success. Whatever one thinks of the three-year-olds, it must be acknowledged that the two-year-olds are an uncommonly good crop, and we find a lot of interest in them. New Yorkers were enthusiastic about Jet Pilot when they saw him swerve five furlongs in :56% in the National Stallion. He seemed to be looking for a turn, and may have won by lengths had be stayed straight. That was the third success in as many starts for Mrs. Grahams 1,000 son of Blenheim II. He showed a game race at Pimlico, where he beat Shaffie on a set of sore shins. There is nothing "short bred" about Jet Pilot and he may go on being a top colt. Trainer Jim Smith will send him here for summer engagements at Arlington and Washington. It will be interesting to see him hook up with the Joliet winner Preoccupy, and Frankie Catrone says that Eternal War will follow him to this area, if he continues to race like a worthwhile eligible for the Futurities. Zach time Jet Pilot runs, that yearling brother of his A. B. Hancock is grooming for the Keeneland sales accrues more value. Some of the experts thought Jet Pilot ought to be a little larger as a yearling. He has grown into a colt who is clearly big enough. Racing still suffers from a dearth of capable riders. The few there are can almost pick their own mounts. It is not unusual for them to make tentative engagements on two or three in one stake, then accept the ride on the horse who seems to them to have come up to the race with the best chance, leaving the trainers of the others to make whatever arrangements they can at the last moment. At New York we watched one bug rider who may have a future. This is Paul Miller and he was recently taken under contract by C. V. Whitney. Miller is a serious youngster of 23 who hails from Philadelphia and was developed by the Brandywine stable of Don P. Ross, the Delaware Park executive. Unlike the vast majority of riders, and particularly the apprentices, Miller can steady a horse until he gets on stride leaving the gate and make his run where it is likely to be the most profitable. The modern tendency is to whoop-te-doo. Quite apart from all these technicalities, we think that the development of young, ambitious riders is a healthful thing for the sport.
