Baltas hoping Next Shares shows up for Kilroe Mile

ARCADIA, Calif. – At least once a year in the last few seasons, Next Shares has displayed a brilliant performance in a graded stakes on turf. At least once a year, Next Shares has run a clunker.

Earlier this year, Next Shares was last of 12 in the Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup Turf Championship at Gulfstream Park on Jan. 25, a loss preceded by a 27-1 win in the Grade 2 Seabiscuit Handicap at Del Mar on Nov. 30.

The sequence of events leaves trainer Richard Baltas somewhat guarded about how he thinks Next Shares will run in Saturday’s Grade 1 Frank Kilroe Mile on turf at Santa Anita.

“The thing about him is he either runs his race or he doesn’t,” Baltas said. “There is no middle ground.”

Next Shares has won seven of 30 starts and earned $1,677,771. In 2018, Next Shares won the Grade 1 Shadwell Turf Mile at Keeneland, but was 13th in the Breeders’ Cup Mile in his following start at Churchill Downs.

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Earlier that season, Next Shares was second in the Kilroe Mile. Last year, Next Shares was last of six in the Kilroe Mile as the 7-2 third choice.

In the Pegasus World Cup Turf at 1 3/16 miles earlier this winter, Next Shares was third on the backstretch, but faded quickly through the stretch.

“He didn’t fire,” Baltas said. “He drew the outside.”

The $400,000 Kilroe Mile has a field of seven probable starters, including the 5-year-old Got Stormy, a finalist for champion turf female of 2019. Other candidates are the Baltas-trained Desert Stone, Frontier Market, Ohio, River Boyne, and True Valour.

Got Stormy, who was second in the BC Mile here in November and won the Grade 1 Matriarch Stakes at Del Mar on Dec. 1, was fourth at 1-5 in the Grade 3 Endeavour Stakes at Tampa Bay Downs on Feb. 8.

River Boyne won the Grade 3 Thunder Road Stakes at a mile on Feb. 8.

The Kilroe Mile is one of four graded stakes on Saturday’s program.

Gift Box and Midcourt, stakes winners earlier at this meeting, are the lead contenders in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Handicap for older horses at 1 1/4 miles.

Thousand Words, the unbeaten winner of the Grade 3 Robert B. Lewis Stakes, and Storm the Court, the champion 2-year-old male of 2019, are expected to start in the Grade 2 San Felipe Stakes for 3-year-olds at 1 1/16 miles. The $400,000 San Felipe Stakes is a key prep for the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby on April 4.

The Grade 2 San Carlos Stakes at seven furlongs will be the 2020 debut of Law Abidin Citizen, who won the Grade 3 Longacres Mile at Emerald Downs last August. Flagstaff, second in the Grade 2 Palos Verdes Stakes at six furlongs on Jan. 25, is likely to go favored.