GOLD STRIKE! EIGHT WINNING BANKERS: Daqman landed his eighth maximum-stakes bet (8 out of 11, so 72% strike rate) and nap number 19 of the new year (52%), with a 30-point gold banker on Frodon (WON 4-9), the Scottish Future Champions’ Novices Chase winner yesterday, after landing the 6-1 Edinburgh National scorer on the opening day at Musselburgh on Saturday.
DAQMAN’S FOUR WINNERS ON THE DAY: Frodon and Douvan both won for Daqman’s Fortune Cookies among four winners on the day, including those successful in the Scottish Supreme Novices Hurdle Trial at Musselburgh and both the cross country and the Tied Cottage Chase at Punchestown. SPs were:
WON 9-2 Auvergnat
WON 7-4 Lough Derg Spirit
WON 4-9 Frodon (gold banker)
WON 1-14 Douvan
DAQMAN MONDAY: Slim pickings this Monday with only two meetings to choose from but Daqman has three bets for the day including a banker at Sedgefield and a short-priced lay at Wolverhampton.
WE WANT MORE BIG WINNERS
Look out this week! I have a lot of previews this week, and I’ll start tomorrow with the story so far of my naps and bankers, and the big-odds feature race winners that have taken me 57-points clear of Pricewise.
What’s the plan, Daqman? Where will my next high-priced scorer come from? How can I set the five-week naps sequence on fire in week six?
NEWBURY HURDLE: I’m whetting your appetite below for the sifting and sorting that could throw up Saturday’s big winner in the race won last year by a 16-1 shot.
IRISH GOLD CUP: We’re getting so close to Cheltenham now that Newbury Saturday and next Sunday’s Irish Gold Cup meeting at Leopardstown will be crucial tests, particularly the Irish venue when the Deloitte Novice Hurdle looks turnkey to several races at the festival.
FORTUNE COOKIES: We’ve had three more winners since I last published Fortune Cookies, and at the end of the week I will present my final festival team, after Newbury and Leopardstown.
SEVEN IS NOT A LUCKY NUMBER
Beware the social runners! That’s in Saturday’s Newbury Hurdle, 50 years on from one of racing’s great controversies when Hill House gave trainer extraordinary Capt Ryan Price his fourth win in five years, in what was then called the Schweppes Gold Trophy.
Price was banned when a steroid was traced in the post-race dope test but, in one of the earliest pieces of laboratory detective work in racing, it was found that the animal manufactured his own cortisol.
Hill House was the first winner of the race aged seven, and would never have won it in the modern arena where younger horses from the Flat are trained to hurdle at speed.
Owners simply can’t afford the luxury of store horses these days and, if not Flat-bred, then bumpers and Points are the answer. But the maturing of the young horse through the point-to-point field is intended to produce chasers not hurdlers.
All Newbury Hurdle winners bar three (Splash of Ginge, My Tent Or Yours and Get Me Out Of Here) in the dozen years since 2005, came from the Flat, with three from bumpers, the innovation of modern racing which has given raw horses of NH build a chance of earlier maturity with their own Flat races.
In that time since 2005 every winner has been aged five or six, with some seven out of nine carrying 10st 10lb or less. Anything other than the young, fast and lightly-weighted, Flat-bred or bumper trained may just be at Newbury for the social scene.
So don’t panic when you see 41 acceptors: you can ditch 14 on age, and another 10 for weight unless claimers are called in. And the five-day stage will knock out more of them.
Check out the result of yesterday’s Pertemps qualifier on good ground at Musselburgh and you’ll see what I’m talking about: El Bandit (Won 15-2 aged six), third Stoneham (40-1 aged six). Seven is no longer a lucky number in 2m hurdles.
FASHION CAN RULE HIS RIVALS
2.20 Wolverhampton Russian Soul was a great servant to Mick Halford in Ireland for many years amassing over £350,000 in prize-money but was undoubtedly a character so maybe a switch in yards can add some new spark. He was rated 112 at his peak so is potentially very well handicapped off just 93 here. The trip should be no problem for him and if Adam Kirby can get him away smartly (often slowly away in Ireland) he must have a fair chance. The 6.8 available on BETDAQ looks competitive and he is the bet.
3.20 Wolverhampton Another former Irish trained horse Blue Bahia is a warm order to break her maiden after a second place finish over C&D last time but she is not one to be taking a short price about. She had some extremely smart form on her first couple of starts but looks a regressive type and has dropped from an initial mark of 83 to her current rating of 73. The opposition isn’t the strongest here but Blue Bahia is in the habit of finding something to beat her and as a result is a recommended lay at the 2.2 on BETDAQ.
3.05 Sedgefield This is not the strongest of novice hurdles and looks an excellent opportunity for the progressive King Of Fashion. He readily dismissed his rivals, including a next time out winner, last time and looks to be well clear of the rest in this. It is also significant that Ian Duncan has booked Richard Johnson for the first time today and the partnership can get off to a winning start at 1.57 on BETDAQ.
DAQMAN’S BETS
BACK 5pts win RUSSIAN SOUL (Wolverhampton 2.20)
BANKER: 10pts win KING OF FASHION (nap) (Sedgefield 3.05)
LAY 8pts to lose BLUE BAHIA (Wolverhampton 3.20)
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