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Between Races : By Oscar Otis Corum to Deliver Admonition to Jocks A Novel Aftermath of Citations Win Ward Following Dads Derby Footsteps CHURCHILL DOWNS, Louisville, Ky., May 4.— Bill Coram, we learn, will deliver the "pre-Derby admonition" to jockeys riding in the race, the Churchill Board of stewards having invited him to make the customary address. The stewards, as you probably know, have a special dispensation from the Kentucky Racing Commission to deal out a penalty -of up to a year for any deliberate rough riding in the Derby, and while the Corum speech is in no means in a nature of a threat, it will serve as a reminder to the riders engaged with Derby mounts that the eyes of the world are upon them if we may coin a phrase and that they owe it to themselves and the American public to make the Derby a cleanly run race as well as a hard fought thoroughbred contest. In some years past, the chairman of the Kentucky Racing Commission made the speech, but Corum, who is eloquent with words as well as being a facile man at a typewriter, was deemed the best man to put the message over. "Speaking of the last ten Derbys, I can say they have been most satisfactory," observes veteran steward Jack Young. "Our main problem is that a simple jostle or brush often becomes magnified all out of its true proportion just because it happens in a race like the Derby, which has such great significance. The pictures, comparatively new to Churchill Downs, have afforded us some satisfaction in that they have borne out • our own observations, as in for instance that jam last year when we set Craig down for 20 days when he unthinkingly contributed to a tangle soon after the start. Determine was among the victims but he went on to win despite this early mishap. Craig, as I recall, was something of a drawing power in Ohio, and a few days after the Derby, we got a call from a Guild leader suggesting the punishment was a trifle severe. We told I the man to ask the other riders in the race about it before pressing the point further, and he came back to admit that maybe we hadnt been severe enough. We dealt with Craig fairly, we thought, and made the penalty more lenient than otherwise would have been the case because the boy lacked big time experience and was obviously over anxious." A Man More Stubborn Thain a Horse And, if you wish to get a steward slightly burned, just ask one, "Say judge, is it true that in the D"erby the usual saliva and urine tests are forgotten?" We took this chance, and Young replied, "Well Ill just give you an instance. Going back to Citations year, we had heard that in Maryland, he had proved a difficult horse from which to get a specimen for testing. We called in a young country kid from downstate Kentucky whom we knew to be tenacious, you might say downright .. stubborn, in the extreme. If Citation wins, we told him, just take your dinner and pajamas over to the barn and camp there until you do get a sample. And Ill be darned if he didnt get a box supper and a suitcase with clothes and go right to the barn. He got the sample at 9 oclock that evening." William Woodward, Jr., owner of Nashua, probably hinted that he had something akin to high hopes for his horse and the Kentucky Derby as long as three months agp when he refused an invitation of his old friend, Russ Havenstrite of Los Angeles, to go tiger shooting in India. While Havenstrite was shooting royal Bengals, Woodward was at Gulfstream watching Nashua win the Florida Derby. He has been, of course? on the grounds and at the barns a good deal of the time ever since Nashua unloaded after his rail trip from New York. "I guess you might say Nashua was one reason I declined Havenstrites offer to go to India on that tiger hunt," Woodward smiled, "but there were other reasons too. Id been to India before and got my tiger, and there is an incredible amount of red tape to go through on a shoot. So, while you cant say Nashuas prospects were the only reasons for refusing to go to India, you might say they were among the main ones." Recalls Fathers Activities at Classic Sherrill Ward, the somewhat taciturn -trainer of Summer Tan, is, of course aiming for his first Kentucky Derby score and we gather that victory would be doubly sweet because he might make good for his father. "My dad saddled Dodge and Franklin as an entry in 1916 for his own interest in partnership with a Mr. Weber. Franklin finished third and Dodge fourth to George, Smith and Star Hawk. And, I dont recall, but you might look it up, but father may have saddled Escoba, second to Exterminator in 1918. He trained Escoba at one time, but whether or not he had him for the Derby Im not sure." We did try to check with the facilities available here, but could hot for, although Churchill has a record of almost every phase of the Derby, trainers of also-rans are not among them." When we say that Ward is taciturn, we mean that around the barn in the morning, he gets his conversation in edgewise, devoting a tremendous concentration upon his horse. He watches every step closely, and, as often as not, while carrying on a conversation, he will be looking at the horse, not at the person doing the interviewing. He has absolutely refused to comment one way or the other on the outcome of the Wood, in which Summer Tan was beaten by Nashua, and the last thing he would think of would be coming up with an excuse. Rather, he pays tribute to-Nashua, mentioning, « thenore I see of that hWse, the better e looks."
