Athletics and Football (extract)

ATHLETIC MEETINGS 213 day thseame phenomenoisn alsoto be observeda, lthough the motive on this occasion is not to make records but to win ' pots.' If there are three good quarter-milers in London in the spring, it may be predicted with great confidence that one othf em will be atWoodbridge, another t Colchestera, nd the third at Newmarket. All this cowardice (to use palain word) diis creditable to the sport, anitd is fostered and en­ couraged by the system which takes as the test of a man's merit, nthote quality of the pponents whom he has beaten, but the' tiimne'which he has performed. The sooner, therefore, that athletes learn that timies a test of speed but of nothing else, the bettefror the sport.The race is not always to the peediest, and to possesspeed withopulut ck jourdgment is to havevery little titloe genuine mTeroit.conclude with an old athletic aphorism, ' Fast times do not make the runnera,'nd with this remark we willclose ocuarse againtsitming arnedcords. There onies othepractice which, in ouropinion, has been carried to absurdlimits atthletic meetingAst. a greatmany meetings boys' races are included in the programmes. That a good, strong, lusty schoolboy, w is continualplylaying cricket or footballs,hould comute anradce in public is sensible enough. Athletic sports have now been in full swing for a generation, and many tohfe runnerosf the paastre bringinugp possiblyeoung champions of their own. At first sight, therefore, it seems a genial asnpdortsmanlike notion for races to begiven mateet­ ings fotrhe sons or young brothers or nephews of the members of clubs. But this idea, like some other gooi deas, has led to cruel absurditiesA. t the Civil Service aPnrdivate Banks and othemr eetings, lbitotlyes of six yearsold, anedven less, are tboe seenracing in bhoayns'dicaps, having, of course, p o­ digious starts frothme scratch markers, who are mucbhigger lads. For our own part, we think it is neither good for the minds bordies litotfle boytos runhard races paut blic meet­ ings atll,, andwe shouldlike tosee boys' racres tricted to those ovtewrelve. But even oraf ces feolrder boys theraere far too many. There saoremany, fainct, that regularclass