I04 THE TWO-MINUTE PACERS 



ever looked after the welfare of a horse — Jesse H. Smith — 

 who had all the care of him during the time he was in train- 

 ing- 



"Regarding his shoeing — he wore seven ounce bar shoes 



in front and four ounce open shoes behind. He wore a 

 plain snaffle bit and Raymond check. His boots were many — 

 knee and arm, front shin, ankle and quarter and behind 

 ankle and coronet. 



"In training him we never allowed him to stand any 

 day without jogging. He was a very gross horse and filled 

 up considerably and our principal motto was 'plenty of 

 miles' without extreme speed, starting, of course, with a 

 lot of slow miles in the spring until reaching 2:40. After 

 that period we worked him twice a week, Tuesday and Fri- 

 day. The work on Tuesday would be light, consisting 

 usually of two or three slow heats. Friday was his hardest 

 work day and then we would aim to reduce his time from 

 the 2:40 period about three seconds in one or two of the 

 heats. Then, on the following Tuesday he would have an- 

 other light work and on Friday again he would be reduced 

 three seconds from the previous Friday until we would 

 reach the neighborhood of 2:15 with him. Then for two 

 weeks he would be trained back to 2:22 or 2:25. We would 

 then start him in the same rotation of increase until down 

 to 2:02. He was then ready for fast miles. 



"All of this time, weather permitting, he did not miss a 

 day in harness; even after work days his jogging would 

 consist of two or three miles. We endeavored to score but 

 little, as his work did not require scoring and as a rule he 

 either raced against one horse or went against time." 



Star Pointer made his first public appearance when he 

 was a five-year-old, at Chicago, August 20th, 1894 and raced 

 with success the seasons of 1895 and 1896. But it is of the 

 racing season of 1897 and 1898 that this story is most con- 

 cerned for it was in those two years that he set world's records 

 and entered the two-minute list — the pioneer of the twenty 

 whose stories make up this volume. 



In 1897 he won the free-for-all events at Chicago, Cleve- 

 land and Hartford and was beaten by Joe Patchen at Colum- 



