Alda cuts back in distance for 2021 debut in TVG Limestone Turf Sprint

Wertheimer and Frere’s homebred Alda will start her 2021 campaign where 2020 concluded: at Keeneland.

Trained by Graham Motion, Alda finished 12^th in last fall’s Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf (G1) going a mile. She did not return to the work tab until March 1 at Fair Hill Training Center in Maryland, where she has breezed six times over the all-weather surface.

“This is what we have pointed her for,” Motion said of Friday’s $100,000 TVG Limestone Turf Sprint going 5½ furlongs on the grass. “My intention was to shorten her up for her first start off the break.”

Winner of the Catch a Glimpse (L) and runner-up in the Natalma (G1) at Woodbine last summer, Alda is scheduled to arrive at Keeneland Wednesday. She will be reunited with John Velazquez in Friday’s race.