An Italian Named Tornese

The Canadian champion, Tie Silk, is the youngest starter in the race and at times has shown much ability. Tie Silk is a 4-year-old, and he finished second to Diller Hanover in the 1959 Hambletonian. He is owned by the Miron brothers (Adrien and Gerard), road builders and contractors from Montreal, and will be driven by Philippe Dussault. Tie Silk has done a mile this year in 2:01 4/5.

Iton, the Austrian 8-year-old black horse, eats bread with lard, oranges and grapes and at 14 hands is the smallest horse in the race. Iton will be driven by Baron Andreas von Beess und Chrostin, who drinks wine mixed with lemonade. The baron is familiar with American tracks and training methods. He was in this country for six months in 1958-59 and served as a groom for Johnny Simpson. Simpson recalled the other day, "He was a tremendously hard worker. He'd work and work at cleaning out stalls or doing errands, and after a while everyone forgot that he was royalty (Austrian) and considered him as just one of the boys. He has, as people say of a good horse, real class."

The picking of a winner in any international horse race is a difficult thing. There are so many variants—tracks, drivers, distance races, turns—that a selector gets more confused as he goes along. At a mile and a quarter, however, the draw for post position is not as important as it is at a mile. The natural inclination would be to lean toward the European experts' opinions and pick Hairos to win. If you plan to be at Roosevelt for this International, though, you might not be wasting your time if you take a long look at Tornese. Tornese may very well be the next Horse of the World.