Radical Changes in Care of Race 

 Horses in Past Ten Years 



V '^W" -w-( IRSES nowadays race in much 

 higher flesh than the}- did years 



I 1 ago, due largely to the fact that 



they are not sweated with heavy 



"™" "^ clothes," writes an old-time 

 horseman. "The old idea seemed to be that 

 horses must be 'drawn fine' in order to race in 

 their best form, and in the process of 'draw- 

 ing' them the muzzle played a star part. On 

 race days horses were always muzzled and 

 many trainers also used these feed preventers 

 on their steeds half the time. We now allow 

 the horses to eat practically all the hay they 

 care for, but I can remember when it was 

 rationed off carefully — sometimes weighed. 

 Hoods are very rarely used now, but formerly 

 they were about the most important article in 

 a racer's kit. I have seen caretakers get a 

 hard call-down when they peeled the hood 

 back enough to use the scraper on a horse's 

 neck, it being the custom to scrape under the 

 hood. 



"It was not an unusual thing to get instruc- 

 tions to jog the horse you were caring for five 

 or six miles after a hard race in the 'good old 

 days.' I suppose this was done in order to 

 cool the steed out gradually. It was a shame 

 to see horses piled with blankets and the sweat 

 running off them in streams, when we were 

 cooling them out after a race. They would 

 pant and show every sign of distress, but it 

 was 'the way to do things' at that time, and 

 of course no one figured that it was a bad one 

 for the horses. 



"Soaking tubs have largely followed sweat 

 blankets into the scrap heap, but it took years 

 to discover that their use was injurious to the 

 feet. Constant soaking, often in very warm 

 water, softened the horn of the feet, and, if a 

 horse had corns or thrush, the water aggra- 

 vated instead of helped the troubles. We used 

 to poultice feet with turnips and bran, and 

 while this treatment may have had some vir- 

 tue, claw as used nowadays, is probably of 

 more benefit. Always after a hard race a 

 horse's shoes were removed, and when reset 

 the nails were put back in the old holes. 



"The gait of trotters has changed radically 

 during the past thirty years, and, for that mat- 

 ter, is constantly improving as the horses be- 

 come better bred. All the old trotters used to 

 break, in fact, their trainers taught them to be 



shifty and easily caught after a tumble. There 

 were very few pure gaited ones, too, most ot 

 them having a hitch in their motion, resulting, 

 no doubt, from the fact that they were more 

 inclined to scalp and speedy-cut than the mod- 

 ern type. We didn't know what square toes 

 were, and that method of balancing alone 

 would have been a big help to our faulty 

 gaited ones, had we known of it. 



"Monroe Salisbury was the first trainer I 

 saw who appreciated the fact that excessive 

 jogging dulled a horse's speed; two or three 

 miles was as much as he permitted his horses 

 to be jogged, and he always ordered the boys 

 to step them along and not keep them out jog- 

 ging at a snail's pace. 



"Another great feature of change is the fact 

 that drivers do not take hold of their horses 

 as they did in the long ago. Light hands came 

 into vogue with such trainers as Mace, the 

 Goldsmiths, and Splan. We used to see big, 

 powerful drivers leaning back, the lines wrap- 

 ped around their wrists, pulling with all their 

 might. Of course there were exceptions, but 

 nearly all the old-time teamsters were very 

 strong in their arms. If our finely balanced 

 trotters of the present were driven in the old 

 'strong arm' fashion, many of them would be 

 pronounced quitters ; also they would soon go 

 bad gaited as a result of being doubled up. 



"As I stated in the beginning of this story, 

 vast improvement has been made in all de- 

 partments of horse training and care, but 

 there is one feature that, in my opinion, has 

 not been improved upon. This is the care of 

 the racers' legs. The boys nowadays sop some 

 strong wash on the legs of their horses and, 

 after hitting them a few licks with their 

 hands, wrap a fold of cotton around them, 

 slap on a bandage, and let it go at that. I 

 still follow the old plan of hand-rubbing the 

 legs several times during the day, also at night 

 and early in the morning. To massage legs 

 properly they must be kept damp with a 

 sponge and the rubbing must be done gently. 



"It is not well to rub too hard or take hold 

 of the tendons too tightly. If you rub the leg 

 till it is perfectly dry and then keep up your 

 treatment, it will heat, thus causing fever. Be 

 sure to keep it wet and don't be afraid that 

 you will do too much hard work in this line — 



