The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1907-03-03
GETTING READY FOR
SPRING TRAINING
Eastern Horses Being Shipped
to New York Tracks for
Early Work.
Tribune Special Sporting Service.

tribune special Sporting Service,
NEW YORK. March 2.-Local train
crs who have been ordered To prepare
horses for carly meetings are apprehen-
slve that weather and track conditions
Will prove unfavorable, and THAT IT, may
be difficult TO wind their candidates up
to the proper stage Of condition without
taking them TO BcnnIngs earlier tnal
usual. The present winter has been a
severe one. and the frost is deep IN the
ground at Gravcsend and Sheepshead
bay Although the genera! health OF
the ho-ses chartered AT these tracks Is
excellent, they arc. as g general rule,
carrying considerable flesh that must be
worked OF before racing will DC posi-!
BILE
Before the recent snowstorm and cold
snap many of the trainers had begun
TO give their horses light exercise, pre-
hminaTy TO the stiff ordeal of training
for actual races The recent heavy
snow prevented much of this kind of
work, and the cold for several days was
too intense TO permit of outdoo? exer-
else, The little that was accomplished
took place III the shelter of the stables
and sheds, and consisted merely OF
walking or slow Jogging.
II is only little mere than three
weeks to the opening OF the season ut
Bennings. and unless protracted pc
riod of mild weather sets in soon very
few of the locally trained horses Will be
able to show their proper form. AS the
Sheepshead bay and Gravesend runners
are Invariably tho 'class' az tho
Washington session, unpreparedness will
of course result in more or less fiuky
racing, quite apart from the fact that
when horses of various sections race to-
gether many of the results are likely to
be unexpected
When training operations are inter
fercd with during the winter, or when
racing begins after n long spell of broh
on weather, trainers discover peculiari-
ties about their horses of which they
may previously have been in ignorance.
Some horses will be found TO fit them
selves for the stress of actual racing
on the lightest possible preparation and
are almost certain TO be prominent in
the early days OF the season, while 9th
ers take great. amount of galloping
before they arc fit to race, Al Ben
nings and the early meetings around
New York the horses that raced during
the winter at New Orleans or on the
Pacific coast arc generally found 10 be
In front IN majority of races. So, too
the runners which were actively EN-
ployed up TO the end of the local season
will generally be found to have an
"edgeN on those which were retired at
inc enu Oi lHe bSlinOHI park ldll SESSION
or earlier
Some horses when entered for the
winter Immediately begin TO put on
flesh, while others hardly lose their racy
appearance in two or three months of
idleness. Again, when active work is
resumed some gross horses, ''good do
ers,' as the trainers term them. may
take two or three months to reach rae
ing condition again. and the effort to
get a race out of this kind not infre-
quently results in premature break
down. Nor can it be said that appear
ances go for much in such cases Con-
stitutions vary greatly, and it is oc~
casionally a mistake to assume that n
hght-waisted horse will invariably reach
condition with short period of train
ing, One horse Will show his best form
when, 10 the eye, he is as fine as crow
Some lusty horses always run big, and
some Hghtly-built horses never vary
much in outward appearance. 1t is pure
ly question of sufficient preparation,
and for that reason local trainers are
looking anxiously for suitable training
weather.