Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-12-03
SPORTS OF ALL SORTS
Steeplechases Should Be Run
On Business Principles.
NEED OF CONTINUITY
MANY IMPORTANT DECISIONS BY
NATIONAL TRoTTING BOARD,
Fast Fight in PhiladeIphia-Death of
Noted Oarsman-Medals
for Autoists.
NEED OF CONTINUITY

One element which has done much to-
ward making racing successful in every
country where it has become an institu-
ton is the fact that it has been taken up
by the fashionable set. says Belmont Purdy
in the New York Telegraph. And yet the
fashionable element cannot alone make
racing of any sort go, as is proved by the
utter failure Of our smart set to make
racing success Of the hunt-race meetings,
all of which are racing failures while at
the same time successful social gather
ings.
Cedarhurst was failure because those
who started the enterprise counted on it's
earning sufficient to pay it's running ex-
penses. and they were insufficient to carry
1t over a bad period
Mr. Waterbury's race meetings at West
chester, at the same time as Cedarhurst
were a dead financial load on that gentle
man. who discontinued them when he could
not afford to run them out of his own
pocket any longer.
/ The Meadow Brook meetings of that Pc
riod were stopped because the Stewart es-
I tate's manager wanted rent for an unin-
closed part of the plains, from which no
income could be derived because no gate
money could be collected, and the Waver1y
and other meetings We're discontinued be-
| cause the principal ones-Meadow Brook,
Cedarhurst and Observation-Disclosures stop
ped.
Later on Mr.. Whitney gave hunt meet
ings his place at Westbury for two
years. when he also stopped, and lately
there has been some effort to start them
again on Long Island and in WeStcheSter
all more or less unsuccessful, but all
backed up by the fashionable people whose
sanction goes a long way toward estab-
fishing sport of any sort, from golf to
bull lighting.
The reason for this want of success is
that two other factors are equally impor-
tant. and both are well understood by the
in their control. One is that to succeed
the sport must be carried out on sound
business principles. and the other is that
1t must be run, as sport, in such a way as
to give it's patrons confidence that it viii
be continued They want to feel assured
that colts purchased with view to MAX
ing them into hunters which may be able
to win the Meadow Brock cup or the West
chester cup three or four years from now
will certainly have these cups to race for.
1t is the lack Of these solid racing princi-
pies which has made the hunt meeting
failure with US, in spite of society's back
ing.
Any reasoning man who takes an inter-
est in steeplechasing must see that in
spite of the fact that there is little
in common between our hunting and
our version of the sport between the
flags, 1t is the hunt meeting which should
supply the more serious branch of sport
with horses and riders.
Take the horses of H. S. Page, w. G.
Hayes, #. Hitchcock, jr., and other hunt
ing men, and you never see them being
scheoled in public, nor do yon see the men
from, the hunting field making exhibitions
of themselves in jumping races. AS 1t is
now, steeplechase Jockeys get their school
ing in the infield with the green horses or
in public in races.
If the hunts would run their little meet
ings twice a year regularly, and all meet
together once n year where they could
compete, club against club, an inclOsed
course, such a meeting would be crowded
by a class of people willing to pay IS at
the gate instead of 81, and in time the
sport of steeplechasing could be put on a
better basis than l"0ks possible today un-5
der existing conditions.
This year has brought about lot of
good in the jumping races, but still much
Improvement is TO be expected and may be
reasonably looked f0r from the hunt clubs
and the horses and men brought up in that
school-not from that class which knows
nothing better than getting over brush
Jumps as fast as possible in a way that
will win, even if ii uses up the animals
prematurely and kills mains reckless
men who know that they are risking their
necks to make a living.