Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-10-29
THE BENh|NG MEETING
Many Horses Now Stabbed at
the Track.
TRAINING WORK BEGUN
THE GOING Is FASTER THAN IN
RECENT DAYS
Six Furlongs Reeled Of in Training in
1.16ETwo Stakes Close Today
Whitney Memorial.
TRAINING WORK BEGUN

The approach OF the fall racing season Is
heralded by the daily arrival at Benning Of
some of the best known stables on the
American turf. The applications for sta
BILE room exceed by $50 the stalls available
at the track. The ingenuity Of Superin-
tendent Thomas Strahan is being taxed to
provide quarters for the uthe-limbed thor
oughbreds who are to contest for the rich
stakes and purses that abound in the au-
tumn racing program. The barns In the
neighborhood of the course will be filed to
the limit, and all requests for stable reser-
vations are being scaled down wherever
possible. The promise of high-class racing
Is the brightest ever held out by the local
association.
Already there are enough horses at the
track to carry out good meeting, al
though racing does not begin until Novem-
Der II and the great bulk of the stables
will not ship until that time. The closing
days of the metropolitan circuit at Jamaica
and Aqueduct offer richer prizes this year
than ever before. This has been a season
of unparalleled prosperity on the turf and
the tempting stakes of the fall have kept in
active training some of the best horses OF
the year The Benning program is full of
features and will serve as still further in
ducement to owners and trainers to keep
the pick of their stables ready for the bar
rier.
trainers now here to be in better condition
than at any meeting of the past. The
sandy surface has been rolled and packed
and narrowed by the men under Tom
Strahan's direction until it has become
wonderfully fastand firm. The home
stretch, which has long been a source of
trouble has been whipped into shape and
is declared to be almost as fast as the
splendid back stretch Horses which cam
not in training trials turn three-quarters on
the track as it stands today in III are ac-
counted we'll nigh worthless, so far. as the
company they will be called upon to meet
at Benning when racing actually begins.
Most OF the trials at six furfongs are done
al 1 16 or under.
Fast Furlongs Reeled Off.
Horses have been reeling off furIonps at
Il 10 seconds with their heads in the air.
II is believed that the competition of racing
Will bring the slX-furlong events down to
LA, which will be vast improvement in
the time made at the spring meeting, when
the track was fetlock deep in sand The
main track has been brought to a condition
parallel1ng that of the Columbia course,
ana when this is said the improved condi-
tlon can readily be appreciated by the fol-
lowers of local racing.
Each morning nowadays the track is fair
~ nlled with horses at exercise and train
ing Some of the thoroughbreds are al
ready in racing condition, and these are
given comparatively easy work in order ,,
just in process of being brought into trim.
and they have harder tasks set for them
by the trainers. Such well-known handlers
.of horses as w. p. Burch, Preston Burch |
f. n Hanna OF the Columbia stable. Theo-
idore Coles. Johnny Pangle. " NJ Powers
and others have their strings under cover
at Benning and are whipping them into
shape. The weather has been ideal for
training purposes, and the horsemen as
well as the jockey club officials are hoping
present conditions will continue through
out the approaching meeting.
The racing this fall will be replete with
horses that have never before appeared on |
the local track. The colors of the best |
stables known to the turf will flash in COM
petition with those which have been faInl- |
lar to the Benning patrons for years. AS
usual, the western contingent at the meet |
ing Will be large one. Benning serves to |
bring together more eastern and western
racing interests than any other track in the |
east, not excepting Saratoga, where the |
western represen tation is usually a large
one. Some of the westerners have already
arrived and they have a hardy lot of cam
paigners in their barns. There is general
impression that there is not as much
class among the western racers as in the
eastern thoroughbreds but the westerners |
have notable way of winning that upsets
all these expert calculations. A striking
exemplifcation of this fact is the case of
Oiseau. the western two-year-od, who
came east in time for the classic Futurity.
There were many willing to concede that
o1Scdu was Ia1T sort OF colt, Dut none
of the eastern trainers thought he CLASS
ed with the pick of the two-year-old
racers in this section. Oiseau was at 81
to 1 in the Futurity betting. and as luck
would have it. did not figure in the result.
Evidently he not altogether ready at
that time, for since then Oseau has shown
clean pair of heels to his competitors in
every stake in which he has raced. Clearly
there are some very shifty animals hailing
from Lochinvar-land
Two Stakes Close Today.
Two of the stakes on the fall program
close tonight. One of these is the Column
bia handicap. at seven furlongs, with added
meme to the amount of $1,000. This race
will attract the very best horses at the
track. One of the entrants is Graziallo the |
clever little colt from the Columbia stable.
which won the second Benning handicap at |
the spring meeting at the same distance.
The Columbia handicap is run over the
Columbia course and will prove one of the
most interesting events of the meeting. 1T |
is scheduled for the opening day. The Sec |
ond fixture which closes tonight is the |
Bladensburg steeplechase handicap, with |
$I60 added money. This race will also be |
run the opening day. The steeplechase rep
resentation at the meeting this fall Will be |
by far the finest the local course has ever |
known. The cross-country game has BE- |
come very popular all over the racing civ |
cult. 1t has always held out unusual
degree of interest to Washingtonians. The
admirers of this sport will have an unusual |
feast during the fifteen days of the autumn |
session at Benning.
As another great boon to steeplechasing, |
and purely sporting event, comes the |
announcement of the whitney Memorial |
steeplechase.2 to be run the first day of |
the inaugural meeting at the magnific ant |
Belmont Park race course, near New York, |
which will be opened next June, taking the |
place of Morris Park In the racing arrange
ment.
The Whitney Memorial is named In honor
of the late William c.. Whitney who did |
so much to build up the turf in the United
States and who always took a great in
terest In eross-country events. This race
is patterned after the rich Saratoga special |
for two-year-olds in that the subscription
is so heavy as to make it purely an event |
for sportsmen. Its conditions call for SUBJ
scriptions of $500 each, half forfeit, to the |
winner. These subscriptions are to be ta-
ken on or before November Is. The West
chester Association, which will conduct the
racing at Belmont, is to add S. 200 to the
race. of which $1,000 will go to the second
and $500 to the third horse. The National
Steeplechase and Hunt Association will pre-
sent plate to the value of $500 to the win |
ner. Subscription blanks for this rich event
have been received in this city by Mr.. s. T.
Walton, secretary of the Washington
Jockey Club. and it is believed that several
of the WeIl-knoWn Virginia breeders will