I^O THE TWO-MINUTE PACERS 



also was surprised at the bar shoes behind, but Prince Alert 

 wore that kind and Mart Demarest says the object was to 

 strengthen them. 



William's first two-minute mile was the first one in 

 time so fast to be done in a regular race though Minor Heir 

 had paced in 1 :59 when he was a member of the exhibition 

 stable of M. W. Savage. Treating the William mile as a 

 world's race record the statisticians gave him four world's 

 marks as the result of his Grand Rapids Grand Circuit race 

 which he paced in 2:001/,, 2:00, 2:02l/>. Those marks 

 were: Fastest mile in a regular race; fastest second heat; 

 fastest mile by a four-year-old; fastest three-heat race. At 

 the beginning of 1922 his record for a four-year-old still 

 stands as well as his record of l:58l/i> for a five-year-old. 

 As these were both race records they in reality give William 

 four world's records. 



The fractional time of William's record mile, 1 :58l/2 

 and of the two-minute mile in the second heat of the same 

 race is: 3014, 1:0014, 1:30, l:58yo and 31, 1:01, 1:30%, 

 2:00. That is evidence of the fact that on that particular 

 day he was master of the pacing division and serves to bear 

 out the belief of Mr. Marvin that no living pacer could have 

 beaten him that year had he gone on racing. The time of 

 the two miles was within a half-second of the world's two- 

 heat record set by Directum I the previous year at Columbus 

 and William was the horse that forced him to do it. In 

 the race in which he made his record William also lowered 

 the world's record for five-year-olds. 



Mr. Marvin has referred us to the history of the American 

 turf for the great achievements of William. Let us glance 

 at that history and see something of what he did. 



As a three-year-old he took part in six races and won all 

 of them. In doing so he secured the world's record of 2:05 

 for three-year-old pacers and the record of 2:09 for three- 

 year-old pacers over a half-mile track. As one writer on 

 turf topics said: "Although the good colt's campaign was 

 confined to a very small section of the United States the 

 harness horse world was aware that a star of the first magni- 

 tude was arising in the Central West." 



