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i Between Races By OSCAR OTIS Del Mar Derby Renewal Saturday U.S. Remount Lip Tattoo Pioneer Hyperion Blood Demand Continues DEL MAR, Calif., Aug. 18. While the Del Mar summer season has pretty well been dedicated to the glorification of the two - year - olds, it is nevertheless a program which is beginning to pay off lush dividends in public- interest. It is also a program which had added charm of providing new equine heroes for the populace and thus makes it possible for Del Mar to avoid complete reliance upon the familiar handicap names, names which all too frequently in the West have a way of becoming shopworn because of steady campaigning. This item remains true even though occasionally Del Mar will offer its fans as good a race as can he, found in the nation, as witness the Sea-biscuit Ligaroti match of a decade ago, and, more lately, Royal Serenades presence in the Del Mar Handicap only last Saturday. But this week, the emphasis has turned momentarily to three-year-olds, and, come this week-end, the ninth running of the Del Mar Derby, a 5,000 added .affair at a mile and one furlong, is down for decision. Only two really top horses have ever won the Derby, Bolero, back in 1949, and Great Circle in 1950. Both these horses are in stud, or rather, Bolero is, and Great Circle will make his court debut in Kentucky this season. The Del Mar Derby is at handicap weights, and as . such is not a Derby at all, but, as we have pointed out on more than one occasion, in our West the word Derby is a magical name at the entrance wickets and the Del Mar people may be pardoned if they card their three-year-old top stakes of the summer as a Derby, usihgs the word in its broadest meaning. V During the last few years, it has been the fashion to mention that racing has supplanted professional baseball as Americas number one spectator sport, and insofar as the situation in the Far West is concerned, the Coast league is in dire condition, box-office, wise. Within the turf industry, there has been much self soul searching and criticism of racings broad public relations program, although such a keenobserver as Spencer Drayton has remarked that from the point of view of baseball, maybe racings public relations arent quite as weak as they might seem to those associated in the turf industry. Be that as it may, we learn that another major spectator sport is taking such a nose dive, attendancewise, that the Los Angeles papers are reporting the unusual "viewing with alarm" attitude on the part of its promoters. We refer to big time automobile raTcing. While the Indianapolis national event was a smasher, a serious decline has set in since then. While some blame poor weather and TV competition in areas having TV, the sports analysts think that other factors , are involved, including lack of showman- Ship, decrease in number of "name" drivers, and poor handling of press-radio -TV contacts. We are mentioning this as added substantiation of the widespread belief in the Far West that the future of racing is tied in directly with such items as showmanship the theatre type, paddock is a good example, name horses, perhaps the 00,000 purse and certainly sound press-radio-TV coverage, a coverage which can only be sound as long as confidence in the integrity of racing prevails generally. Over the week-end, the TRA cited the seventh anniversary of the lip tattoo sys-4 tern for thoroughbreds, a procedure which has eliminated the one-time turf problem of the ringer. In connection with. this, we think it should be mentioned that, while the use of the tattoo for thoroughbreds is only seven years old, the system is more than, 5,000 years old as applied to livestock. And when we say 5,000 years old, we mean there are records to prove the point. For some reason, during the last 100 years in America, branding was favored for horses, but never became popular with thoroughbreds because of the fancied "disfiguration" involved. The lip tattoo pioneer work was acpom-plished in this country by the United States Remount, and a leader in its development, as well as an authority on the Continued on Page Forfy-TAree BETWEEN RACES By OSCAR OTIS 1 I , 1 j Continued from Page Three history of animal tattooing, was Fred W. Koester, a Colonel who is now retired and , is sharing his time between being an of- : ficial at Santa Anita and field agent for J the California Breeders Association. Colonel Koester gladly made ;his knowl- ; edge available to the TRA, and his sys- ! " tern became the foundation for the pres- ent tattoo system with only minor 1 changes, the most notable being secret and virtually counterfeit proof dyes, ! plus a vast improvement in the technical : quality of the ink. In any event, the turf should give a great deal of credit to Koester and the Army Remount for i helping solve one of its worst problems. We suppose that to remark that Hyperion blood is in keen demand in California, along ! with most everywhere else in the world, ! would be a redundancy, but it is somewhat newsworthy that said demand appears to be almost insatiable. George Bucknam, presl- dent of the Del Mar Sales Company, is , trying his hand at the syndication of an Australian son of Hyperion, Scorpion by name, and, to date, the response has been : excellent. Scorpion traces back on the " bottom to Plucky Liege, and he has sired ; some stakes winners in Kangarooland, Incidentally, this corner has repeated! pointed out that California was long overdue in the matter of syndication of v stallions, but we believe a trend toward such a status is becoming noticeable. c Admiral Drake was "sold out" within 10 days after being offered at a modest price, and the response was such an eye-opener to West Coasters that, while the rush isnt exactly on, such seems to be in the making. About the only sour note we have heard on the very much improving California breeding picture is the word from some stallion owners that owners of mares still tend to wait until the. last possible moment before even thinking seriously about a mating nick or cross. Horses and People: Barry Whitehead, racing secretary at Golden Gate Fields, has put the finishing touches on his first condition book, a book that is guaranteed to be "competitive" to any other planned meeting in the Far West. . . . The book will be in the hands of horsemen within a week. . . . Theres quite a behind-the-scenes hasssp-i going on over whether or not managements should use the McDonald scarifier as a standard machine to condition racing surfaces. . . . Doc Bond of Versailles has been inked to pound the hammer at the early September second annual Del Mar sales Del Mar good will man Eddie Read, now with the Surf and Turf Club on a year round basis, is readying some year round, off-season promotion, which will probably be of great benefit to Del Mar in particular and the California turf in general.
