The New York herald., 1921-05-15
WEIGHT HANDICAP
IN TROTTING RACE
Harness Horses to Carry 1t on
Their Backs in $4,000 Con-
test at Columbus.
HORSEMEN ARE SCEPTICAL
Experiment Will Be Watched
With Interest by Follow
ers Of Grand Circuit.
HORSEMEN ARE SCEPTICAL
BY GURNEY G. CUE.

iictLlIS Ill SOluhuDu0 0CAI 6SpsohAboA
Official handicappers not yet named are
to allot the weights by which It Is hoped
10 bring the Peter Mannings and Arion
Guys back to the class OF the Peter
Clamshells. Can they do It? The trot-
ting fraternity waits anxiously and
doubtfully to see-
Though something like this plan was
tried in a race at Grand Rapids good
many years ago. tho Columbus expert
ment OF handicapping harness horses by
means Of weight on their backs is sub
stantially new. AS practised at Grand
Rapids, 1t was farce the maxi
mum weight having been so insig-
nificant that II had no perceptible
effect on any of the starters. 1t
was a good deal like putting fifty
pounds on Man o. War and twenty-five
on some selling platter for a running race
at one mile. The inferior horses had no
more chance than If all starters had car
ried the same weights. All racing ex-
perience goes to show that 1t takes a
real lump of weight to stop horse, par
ticularly a good one, at such distance.
Unless the Columbus handicappers can
get clear away from the idea that q
more difference in light weights will do
the business the best horse entered Is
pretty sure to bring homo the bacon.
Means Prosperity for Track.
This $4,000 race reflects the keen
desire of the commercial element in
trottinS to find some way by which har-
ness horses can be SO handicapped that
good, bad and Indifferent may be
brought together in contest with the
,t.1~~ -
best to win. If the thing can be ac-
complished it will vastly Increase the
element of uncertainty in harness rae
ing. And uncertainty of results will
greatly stimulate the betting, thereby
improving the earning capacity OF Sec
ond and third rate horses while pro-
longing the period of their usefulness
On the running turf this system OF
handcapping by weight has been re-
duced to science almost, and 1t Is
largely responsible for the present un-
eNampled prosperity of racing associa-
tions, jockey clubs and breeders Of race
herses.
The same system might be readily
introduced with full force and effect in
trotting and pacing races IL the spon-
sors for the sport had the spirit and
the enterprise to substitute saddles for
sulllies. Now that harness horses are
being forced off the roads. and virtu-
ally off the earth. by the building OF
fintirard highways and driveways every
where for motor vehicles. 1t seems
strange that votaries of trotting do no,
change front to meet the changed con-
ditions by developing their horses fol
riding instead of driving, and by racing
them under saddle instead of to sulky
1t would only be getting back to first
principles, nearly all trotting races hay.
ing been decided under. saddle until wei
along toward the middle of the las
century.
Records Classify Trottcrs.
Handicapping by weight. was never
practised on the trotting turf In the
days of saddle racing. All horses car
ried the same weight, las pounds. If
the enthusiastically all races were
matches or sweepstakes-wished to han
dicap the horses they stipulated that
one should go to wagon, another to sulky
and perhaps third under saddle, the
last way being deemed the fastest.
Sometimes the best horse was further
handicapped by being required to pull
wagon weighing with driver 800 or
400 pounds, but such thing as vary
ing the impost carried by trotters under
saddle was substantially unknown.
The now universal system of classify
ing trotters and PAGERS according to their
best records. as measured by tho watch,
is of more recent origin than horsemen
OF the younger generation In harness
racing would suppose 1t to be. AS early
as 1S45 there were a few races "for
green horses and "for horses that
never won more than $100," but have
been unable to find in a fairly careful
search of the Spirit Of the Times any
race before 1855 in which time made in
public was the basis OF classification
This system did not originate on any
OF the great Long Island tracks-the
Union, Fashion and Centreville--but at
Lexington. Ky. The meeting was held
on the course OF the Kentucky Associa-
ton, where the runners still hold sway
and the purse was "$125, gate money
added, for all horses that never showed
2:46 IN public and not over eight years
old: milo heats, to go as they please"
which meant saddle or sullxy. In was
won in :33. the fastest time ever made
In Kentucky UP to that date, by the
hve-year-old black gelding Native Amer
lean, converted PAGER, trained only six
weeks before the race.
Let's Best Horse Win.
Not until after the civil war was the
Lexington plan of class racing followed
by any considerable number Of trotting
associations, but as meetings grew more
and moro numerous 1t came into gen.
eral use. From the breeders and
sportsman's point of view II has one
great advantage over any kind of a
handicap In that 1t let's the best horse
win. When the race is a handicap the
prize and the cheers and the headlines
are too often for some inferior horse
that pun In the weights has enabled
TO win by head from one that could
lose him if they met on even terms 1t
Is true that when horses are classified
according 20 their best time there is a
temptation to dodge fast records, but
there Is an equally strong incentive un-
der the other system of racing to de-
colve the handicapper by starting a
horse when not In condition or by not
always trying to win.
The European system OF handicapping
horses in harness racing by starting
some OF them on a mark and others at
various points behind them was tried
here for several years, but 1t could not
survive in competition with the class
system, and Is now obsolete and discred-
tied The weakest spot in the present
system Is the notorius suppression of the
true time made in races on many of the
half mile tracks. Everybody seems to
know what Is being done and where It
Is being done, but with three organiza-
tions bidding for patronage In the gov
ernment of harness racing. the rule
against shading time Is dead letter on