The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-09-13
RUNNERS AND TRo1rERs.
Their Fate Discussed by an Old Time
Trainer

Chicago, Sept. 13.-The News says:
las we look back a few years over
the Held of great running horses that
have come and gone we wonder why it
is that so many of them have gone
wrong, while among the harness horses
we have a few of them breaking down
and in fact seem to live practically for.
ever" said an old time trainer at the
local track recently.
THE list of runners, if one could
think of them all, is large, while
know of few trotters and PAGERS that
have dropped out of existence except
from old age. Some of the greatest
race horses 1 have known have broken
down in their three-year-old form and
others in their four and five year old
career, while the harness horses Just
begin to get good along about the time
they are s, and s years old.
Il have often wondered if horses
would live longer and race better if
they were not raced so hard or in fact
at all as and 3 year olds; but allowed
to grow and become stronger in their
underpinning before being campaigned
on the turf. In these days such large
purses like the Futurity and various
Derbys are offered for 2-year-o lds and
3-year- olds that breeders of thorough
breds feel compelled to race for their
fortunes alone regardless of what be-
comes of the horse. after SUCH an
eventful career as that of Sysonby,
who has won nearly 100000 and is
yet only 3-year-old and bids fair to
displace Domino as the greatest money
maker ever known. it would be impOs-
sibIe to convince any horse owner that
1T is wrong to race colt when he is
growing. Sysonby. however, is one of
the few which has stood the strain so
well. The only defeat in his career
was in the Futurity last year. This
year he raced dead heat with Race
King and has won all his other starts
as he pleased.
'.And yet the secret of the downfall of
runners may be as one trainer once told
me, the fact that runners carry the
weight on their backs, while the trotters
and PAGERS pull it behind them, having
the strain on their breast, shoulders
and mouth instead of on their spines,
where they are probably weaker.
81 asked Doc Tanner. trainer for c.
K. G. Billings, one day why it was that
trotters and PAGERS lasted longer than
runners when the former were evident
ly raced harder, being asked to go five
and six heats and more in races through
out the country. I was surprised when
he said he could not account for it un-
less it was because the harness horses
were not asked to do so much while
young and when their bones and muscles
were soft and also probably because the
harness horses received by far the bet
ter care. He has had experience with
both and if he don't know who does2
"A man who knows anything about
runners will recall the names of Ira
verser, Africander, Irish Lad, Dick
Welles, The Picket, McChesney, Sidney
Lucas. Robert Waddel. Articulate,
Highball, Waterboy, Lucien Appleby,
English Lad, Bessie Spahr, Endurance
| by Right, Beldame, Delhi, Savable, Abe
Frank and scores of others 1 might
name, if given time to think over the
| list. All of these made history in the
| turf world for a while. Then they went
wrong and are soon forgotten. Few of
them will ever race again. Two or three
of them are dead-raced to death. No
gamer race horse ever looked through
bride than Robert Wadde1l, but he
was raced into the ground, and 1 I'M
derstand was finally put to death on
| PA" Bradley's old Virginia farm, where
the gelding was born. Highball, after