Ward: Four Wheel Drive sitting on 'eye-opening' 2020 season

Trainer Wesley Ward believes Four Wheel Drive, coming off a 3-for-3 season that culminated in a gate-to-wire victory in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf, will use that as a springboard to an “unbelievable year.”

Ward noted that shin issues hindered his training of the swift son of American Pharoah for much of last season, including the weeks leading to the rousing Breeders’ Cup triumph. Four Wheel Drive has since returned from an extended layoff with a more robust appearance and appetite.

“He was always a bit light,” the trainer said. “He was kind of a finicky, picky eater. Since the time off, he’s flourished and blossomed.

“He’s got a world of talent and unlimited potential. I’m excited to get him going. Other than the shins, he’s had no issues as far as soundness is concerned. Now that we don’t have to deal with those, I think he’s going to rise to the level of something eye-opening.”

Four Wheel Drive breezed for the first time, on Feb. 4 over Turfway Park’s Polytrack surface in preparation for his highly-anticipated 3-year-old debut. Working with Wish Way, an unraced 3-year-old American Pharoah filly that Ward bred out of his mare Judy the Beauty and still owns, he stretched his legs with a four-furlong drill timed in 51 seconds flat.

“It was nice and easy. That’s what I wanted for him his first work back, especially being a half instead of three-eighths,” Ward said. “They quickened up the last three-eighths.”

The $100,000 Palisades Turf Sprint, at 5 1/2 furlongs on April 2, opening day at Keeneland, has been targeted for Four Wheel Drive’s return to racing. If there should be a bit of wet weather, Ward would not mind.

“He has had some works on soft turf and he has just flown through it,” he said, “so that would not be an issue if it comes up rain and they leave it on the turf.”

That, of course, would bode well for a run at often-soggy Royal Ascot, where Ward has enjoyed unprecedented success for an American trainer. He said he met recently with Mike Hall and Sam Ross, who lead the Breeze Easy ownership group, and emphasized that no decisions were made about Royal Ascot.

A first race also has been picked out for Kimari, the filly that finished a troubled fourth in the Juvenile Turf Sprint. She is scheduled to make her season debut in the $100,000 TVG Limestone Turf Sprint for 3-year-old fillies at 5 1/2 furlongs on April 10 at Keeneland.

“She’s doing great. She had a wonderful work,” said Ward, referring to a four-furlong drill in 47.55 seconds on Jan. 26 at Palm Meadows Training Center in Boynton Beach, Fla. It was the fastest of 34 drills at the distance that morning.

He was not quite as pleased with Maven, another newly-turned 3-year-old by American Pharoah. Maven, noted as the Triple Crown champ's first stakes winner as a sire last season, zipped four furlongs in 49 seconds at Turfway Park on Feb. 3 in his first drill since he resumed training.

“We’re going to work on trying to get him to settle down,” Ward said.

In a sign of how his operation has flourished since he used Royal Ascot as a grand stage to demonstrate his brilliance with precocious young turf sprinters, Ward expects to eventually welcome 43 2-year-olds to his barn, bringing the overall head count to approximately 70.

“I haven’t breezed a 2-year-old yet. Every year I do this, I start backing up later and later,” he said. “I find now that I’ve got some very talented prospects coming up, more so than when I started, the real fast ones come to hand so quickly. They only take a couple of breezes and they are ready to go.”