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BETWEEN RACES By OSCAR OTIS CHURCHILL DOWNS Louisville Ky May 3 Determined bulldog victory in the eightieth running of the Kentucky Derby was at once a vindication of the small gray thor ¬ oughbred as a race horse and the training methods of Willie Molter It was Molter you may recall who dif ¬ fered with owner Andrew J Crevolin on the preDerby schedule for Determine Crevolin wanted to ship him to Kentucky soon after his Santa Anita Derby win but Molter insisted on staying in California and rac ¬ ing at Bay Meadows He won three stakes at Bay Mead ¬ ows including the Bay Meadows Derby then flew in just long enough before the race to get in a prep in the Derby Trial The son of Alibhai has had a lot of racing having been going almost continuously ever since the early sum ¬ mer of his twoyearold form But he is a colt that thrives on racing not work so we imagine it would be fair to say that he has not been overused Molter as he explained to readers in our column several days before the Derby said he preferred the western method of racing horses into peak condition for a big race like the Derby instead of training them in the mornings to attain the same ob ¬ jective We thought that Determine ran a somewhat bril ¬ liant Derby even though there were more excuses than ordinary In fact to be blunt about it a lot of horses en ¬ countered a lot of trouble But Determine had his share at the break but as in the Santa Anita Derby he recov ¬ ered as quickly as a cat and went on about his business businessA A A A AWhile While Determine is Californiaowned developed and raced he is not a Californiabred so the Golden State ob ¬ jective of winning a Kentucky Derby by one bred there as well as owned and raced there is still in the future The Gold Coast has had one foaled there Morvich and now Determine Win Vindicates Molter Methods Coast Still Seeks Home Bred Owned Victor Scope of Derby TV Increased by Millions Newspaper Coverage of Derby Set New Mark Markone one owned and raced there But the combination of all California has yet to score in a Kentucky Derby We do believe however that the success of Determine this year will be an encouraging factor for other owners and train esr to decide this year and in the future to make forays to Kentucky and other big eastern stakes and the Coast de ¬ sired combination slam is bound to come along some day and perhaps in the not too distant future Determines was a good effort and he won in time considered excel ¬ lent although not sensational As for the future his win plus the bold showing of Hasty Road the valid excuses for Correlation and Fisherman and Goyamo all add up to a continuation of the almost overpowering suspense which preceded this Derby By continuation we mean in re ¬ lationship to events to come particularly the Preakness and Belmont which may see the return to the racing wars of Porterhouse Artismo and even perhaps The Pie King who for one reason or another did not race in the Derby DerbyA A A A AAlibhai Alibhai was a great stallion in the West and although unraced he was given a real chance at stud by Louis B Mayer after Beau Pere became a little aged and he be ¬ came an almost instantaneous success Indeed when Louis B Mayer began to break up his empire Alibhai was syn ¬ dicated for the tremendous price of 500000 He proved a bonanza for his shareholders for not only have they gotten their money out but he is still worth 500000 at the going rate for shares a rate established by firm bids As Leslie Combs n has so aptly pointed out most Alibhais have gone to western buyers and his Kentucky crops nave never had a fair chance to demonstrate their abilities to Kentucky race fans But Determine should be a con vincer not only for the Alibhais to go classic distances in classic races but also that the quality of West Coast com ¬ petition is quite on a par with that anywhere else While admittedly small Kentuckians had been advised well in advance that Determine ran not on his size but strictly on his heart They saw for themselves in the Derby what the western turf writers and horsemen have been talking about One more word about Correlation Assuming he came out his race sound we think he will show to far bet ¬ ter advantage in the Preakness and Belmont He was all over the track in the stretch and lugged badly a sure sign that he didnt fancy the footing It is a minor fault but one which was enough to have cost him not the Derby but certainly a better showing Whether he would have won or not is of course a pointless argument for dis ¬ cussion here But the Preakness will be interesting A A A ACBS CBS rating figures on how many people away from the track actually saw the Derby on television will not be available for at least two weeks but it is safe to say that the figure will far surpass the 19000000 plus of last year Ed Wilhelm who handles the Derby TVcast for Gillette tells us the number of stations handling the Derby this year had increased over last year by approximately 25 per cent To be exact about it 128 stations scattered from Boston to San Diego and Seattle to Miami carried the program live from the track By a simple mathematical projection it is safe to assume that as many as 25000000 saw the race on their screens while other millions un ¬ doubtedly tuned in on their radio sets In Australia it is axiomatic that everything stops throughout the nation for the Melbourne Cup and while we doubt if such a state stateContinued Continued on Page Forty BETWEEN RACES RACESBy By OSCAR OTIS Continued from Page FortyFour FortyFourof of affairs comes to pass in tihs country at Derby time within the foreseeable years ahead we do believe that a viewinglisten ing Derby audience of about 45000000 is entirely probable within the next few years yearsA A A A ADerby Derby Sidelights Allie Reuben was com ¬ missioned a Kentucky Colonel at the Derby Eve dinner of the Honorable Order of Ken ¬ tucky Colonels stepped up to receive his commission with a DAILY RACING FORM clearly showing from his coat pocket We have never ceased to marvel at the way the Louisville Police Department in co ¬ operation with the Downs officials manage to get people to and from the track with such rapidity Not too many years ago there were jams lasting until 1030 of an evening but this year most everybody but a few employes had departed by 730 and the streets near Churchill were clear While exact crowd figures are not always immediately available there is no question but that press coverage set a new alltime record The public relations department actually ran out of press credentials Of the more than 750 in thej thejress ress box for various reasons including TV radio men newsreels and Western Union opera ¬ tors some 235 staff members of American daily newspapers filed stories to their re ¬ spective publications But of all Ameri ¬ can publications the DAILY RACING FORM staff was by far and away the largest Churchill Downs incidentally welcomes staffers from smaller papers feeling that to accommodate editors of even small weeklies is good public relations not only for Churchill but also for American racing in general
