Exaulted expected to miss Kilroe Mile

ARCADIA, Calif. – Exaulted, winner of the Grade 1 Shoemaker Mile last May and three other races in 2023, will miss the Grade 1 Frank Kilroe Mile on March 2 at Santa Anita because of a disrupted training schedule this winter.

Trainer Peter Eurton said over the weekend that the absence of daily use of Santa Anita’s infield training track in recent months because of a lengthy renovation has limited Exaulted to jogging on the main track.

Beginning in late 2022 through 2023, Exaulted worked only on the infield dirt training track when stabled at Santa Anita. The training track closed in November for the installation of a Tapeta Footings synthetic surface that is scheduled to open later this month.

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Eurton has opted not to work Exaulted on Santa Anita’s main track in recent months, or at all last year.

“He trained fine on the main track at Del Mar,” he said. Santa Anita’s main track “is a different track than Del Mar.”

Owned by Lee and Susan Searing’s CRK Stable, Exaulted has been limited to jogging two miles a day on the main track.

“He wants to do more,” Eurton said.

The $300,000 Frank Kilroe Mile is the leading winter turf race at the distance in California.

“I don’t see how I can make it,” Eurton said. “I think I’m running out of time.”

Eurton said the Grade 3 American Stakes at a mile on turf March 31 is an option in advance of the Grade 1 Shoemaker Mile on May 27.

“I can make the Shoemaker,” Eurton said.

Exaulted has not raced since he finished second in the Grade 2 Del Mar Mile on turf in early September. He was scratched from the Breeders’ Cup Mile at Santa Anita on race week by a panel of veterinarians.

“He looks good now and he looked good then,” Eurton said. The veterinarians “were tough on him. They were hard on a lot of people. I wasn’t alone.

“It might have been a touch of a foot then. It just didn’t work out.”

Exaulted, 7, has won 5 of 16 starts and earned $663,660. Switched to turf at the start of 2023, Exaulted won his first four starts on the surface, including the American Stakes last April.

The training track is expected sometime between Jan. 21-27, depending on weather, according to Santa Anita racing secretary Jason Egan.

“We’re hoping it will be done in the next two or three weeks,” he said Sunday.

“They’ve done everything they can to keep it moving forward, including working between races,” Egan said of the track’s installation crew.

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