Hit Show's modest Mineshaft figure doesn't concern Cox

Hit Show eked out a victory Saturday over pacesetting Accelerize in the Mineshaft Stakes, his raw time of 1:42.49 for 1 1/16 miles producing a modest 92 Beyer Speed Figure. But the Mineshaft served as a mere means to an end, that being a return to the Dubai World Cup, which Hit Show upset in April.

Florent Geroux urged Hit Show out of the gate Saturday, and the horse raced much closer to the pace than usual, a tactical adjustment required by what many viewed as an inside-biased racing surface.

“It looked like there was a speed bias,” trainer Brad Cox said. “The runner-up was really good. It took a lot for us to get by him. A couple of takeaways from the race: He was wide both turns and the inside seemed to be really good, and a mile and a sixteenth is probably not his game. I think he’s a mile and an eighth-plus. That’s where he’s probably best. It was just to get a run in him.”

While Hit Show’s a known commodity, who knows what the Cox barn has in Shining Star, a 5-year-old Chilean mare who’s unbeaten in three starts since moving into the Cox barn last year and switching to turf sprints. Shining Star on Tuesday stepped up in class from two allowance wins and blitzed the Mardi Gras Stakes, winning by 4 1/4 lengths with a 103 Beyer.

The Giant’s Causeway at Keeneland in April would be “a little quick back,” Cox’s Fair Grounds assistant, Ricky Giannini, said in a Wednesday text, with the Unbridled Sidney on May 1 at Churchill or the Intercontinental about a month later at Saratoga the leading options for the mare’s next race.

– additional reporting by David Grening

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