64 EVERY MAN HIS OWN TRAINER. 



go alone. It requires more driving and more exertion on the 

 part of the horse and man than it would in a race, where there 

 is excitement and competition to assist them. It is a rare 

 thing that you see a first-class trainer driving his horse fast ■ 

 miles in his work, trying to break the owner's or some friend's 

 watch. The fact is that it takes the speed out of him, for his 

 and his friend's amusement, which he should save until the 

 day of his race. The trainer would have been much better 

 thought of in the eyes of the public and his owner would have 

 been much better off financially. It is so natural for the pub- 

 lic to think that the man that wins is much the best driver. 

 You will often hear it remarked by people sitting in the grand 

 stand on the day of a race, " If I had a horse that was going 

 to trot I would want that man to drive him,'' pointing to the 

 man who won the race. Mike Roden always used to say a 

 good horse makes a great driver, and that is so in many cases. 

 I have seen men work along year after year fussing with horses 

 and they were hardly known ten miles from home. Finally 

 he appears on the track with a good horse and goes off and 

 wins his race and in twenty-four hours' time he is known all 

 over the country and is looked upon by the public at once as 

 a great driver. He jumps from obscurity to prominence in one 

 day. Perhaps this was the first horse he had ever had that 

 would have been a benefit to him or any driver, and again it 

 might be that this was the first and last case where the driver 

 and horse nicked to a charm, as I have seen cases where the 

 man seemed fitted to the horse and the horse to the man and 

 neither of them a real success when separated. It is a well- 

 known fact that one man is not a suctess with all horses. I 

 have known an amateur to drive a particular horse much bet- 

 ter and faster than a professional of the first order. He might 

 work a lifetime and never find another horse fitted to him or 

 that he could drive a bit on earth. It is not necessary to men- 

 tion names, but every man who has been in the business will 

 substantiate this statement. That old saying, practice makes 

 perfect, will not apply in this business, as it requires a certain 



