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REFLECTIONS I By Nelson Dunstan Delaware Park Opens 30-Day Meeting Finest Sport Promised at Wilmington Tom Roby Chase Opening-Day Feature Best Two-Year-Old Eligible for Stakes STANTON, Del., May 28. Delaware Park, which opens its annual 30-day meeting here tomorrow, is as close to a "sport for sports sake" proposition as any major race track in this country can hope to attain. When it was oDened in 1937. the idea was to give fans in the Delaware area a quality of horse racing of which they could be proud, with very little consideration as to profits. As a result, the Wilmington course has improved yearly in its quality of racing and efficient management and, we should add to that, complete public confidence. Each succeeding season since the inaugural in 1937 has been an increase in purse distribution, and this year the total has reached approximately 75,000. The 90,000 in added stake money, plus the number of stakes, constitute new high records for the track. Donald Ross, president;; .Bryan Jbieia, vice-president, and the directors have constantly strived to improve human relations with both the horsemen and the jockeys, all of whom play such an important part in the success of any race track. At Delaware they now have one of the most complete and modern jockey quarters to be found in this country. Overlooking the picturesque paddock, the jockey rooms are air-conditioned and have a new post-war "hot box," a piece of equipment that is vital to all the lads in keeping their weight normal. There is also a sleeping room; a veranda where the jockeys can view the races; a recreation room with a billiard table and ping-pong sets. Since the close of the war, track officials who have an eye to the future have deplored the extreme lack of accommodations for the racing public. Inadequate grandstands and clubhouses can be attributed to building restrictions which have made it impossible for most courses to provide necessary comforts. However, most tracks plan to make important improvements when restrictions are removed. Delaware Park is among these plants, but the management of the Stanton course is not content to await the release of mere brick and steel. It is offering this season a five-surgeon medical survice which will be staffed by competent physicians and nurses and which will be in operation on a 24-hour basis; a new tote board and a faster totalisator; motion picture film patrol; expanded police protection, and a parking area that accommodates 12,000 automobiles and is one of the largest east of the Rocky mountains. At the current meeting, Delaware Park will stage 14 stake events that run from 0,000 to 5,000 in added money. Tomorrows feature is the Tom Roby Steeplechase Stakes for jumpers four years old and older and at about two miles. This event has been named for Tom Roby, the steeplechase rider who was injured at Belmont Park in 1942 and- who has not left the hospital from that day to this. While this race is about the only way in which they could pay tribute to this lad who was severely injured, it should be added here that he has had every comfort that medical science can offer, and that the man whose horse he was riding when injured namely, Bayard Sharp has never lost interest in him. Steeplechasing is one of the features of Delaware Parks sport and, in the weeks to come, they will stage the Delaware Spring Maiden Steeplechase, the Georgetown Steeplechase Handicap and the Indian River Steeplechase Handicap. These through-the-field events are highly popular with the steeplechase enthusiasts in the Delaware countryside. Many of the best jumpers in the East are eligibles for these four events. The 10 remaining stake events are for the horses who race on the flat, and they are well balanced in that they recognize all divisions. The Wilmington Handicap, on May 30; the Brandywine Handicap, on May 31, and then the 5,000 Sussex Handicap, which will bring the meeting to a close on July 5, are all for three-year-olds and older horses. Last year the Sussex was won by Pavot, with Gal-lorette second and Stymie third. This year all three of these horses are eligible again, but along with them the list includes Armed, Assault, Bridal Flower, Basileus H., Concordian, Jeep and many others. Armed will hardly be a starter, as he is being pointed for the Stars and Stripes at Arlington Park on July 4. The top three-year-old event is the Kent, which, with 5,000 added, will be run at a mile and a sixteenth on June 14. This race drew 84 nominations, and on the list are the top members of that division now campaigning in the East. Three-year-old fillies will have their inning in the Delaware Oaks on July 4, and the third 5,000 race at the meeting will be the New Castle Handicap, which will be run on June 7 at a mile and a sixteenth for fillies and mares three years old and older. Two-year-olds have always played a prominent part in the Delaware schedule. There are three events for members of this division namely, the 0,000 Polly Drummond Stakes which will be for fillies, at five furlongs, on June 4; the 0,000 Christiana Stakes, which is for colts and geldings and will be run at five and a half furlongs on June 12, and the 0,000 Dover Stakes, which, at five and a half furlongs, is the feature event on Saturday, June 28. Saggy, the sensational colt who won his fifth consecutive race, with nary a defeat, when he took first honors in the Eastern Shore Handicap last Saturday, is an eligible for both the Christiana Stakes and the Dover. Should he go to the post in the Christiana he will meet many of the best bred two-year-olds to be found in the East. On the list are Royal Blood and other babes who have given promise in the racing of that division to date. The entire two-year-old picture may undergo changes before the Delaware Park meeting comes to an end, but one of the questions that may be answered there is whether Saggy is of true championship timber.
