DAQMAN’S ‘HIDDEN HORSES’ STRIKE WITH A 13-2 WINNER: Alongside Daqman’s survey of his betting methods is his search for Hidden Horses. Whenever and wherever he can find them, he presents them with the same transparency of analysis, hoping to spot a gamble. Yesterday’s results:
WON 13-2 MAURICIO (BETDAQ 8.6): ‘Not seen on the Flat for more than two years but has been thereabouts over hurdles and fences this year. They want to win this as a confidence booster’ (Vigorously driven; soon clear- Racing Post ).
2ND 9-4 MEDIEVAL (BETDAQ 7.4): ‘Hasn’t won since September 2017 but has dropped 15lb in the ratings and Paul Cole had a notable cross-Channel double on Friday at Deauville and Goodwood’ (Best backed horse of the day; got to the front a bit too soon – Racing Post).
THE STAKING PLAN THAT KEEPS YOU AHEAD OF THE GAME: There’s another ‘hidden horse’ today as Daqman selects the best race at each of four meetings and plans to finish in front, as yesterday, with his staking plan explained below. Today’s headlines:
🔹 FOCUS BIGGER BETS WHERE YOU WIN
🔹 MOLLS MEMORY BACK IN HER GRADE
🔹 DON’T MISS TOP TRAINERS’ SCHEMES
🔹 LATROBE LOOKS A CLASS ABOVE THEM
🔹 MOKAMMAL IS A WILLING IMPROVER
FOCUS BIGGER BETS WHERE YOU WIN
Whatever happened to Fortune Cookies? Well, thanks for asking. Let it be a prompt to explain revision of my betting strategy.
Since I last posted them, just before the King George, Fortune Cookies have been doing very well, thankyou, with the following list of recent successes:
WON 8-15 Enable (Ascot)
WON 11-8 Liberty Beach (Goodwood)
WON 4-5 Stradivarius (Goodwood)
WON evens Too Darn Hot (Goodwood)
All four were remarkably good odds. Fears of impossibly-long odds-on were not justified at Goodwood, fears that led me to look for something to beat the favourites.
Royal Ascot had warned me: keep the Fortune Cookies separate, and make daily-betting judgments, even to naming those on the Cookies list at the start of the week and not referring to them again.
After all, we are talking about a level-stakes list of horses to follow, so not to be modified or tampered with. I got it right for the 2018 Flat (1,200 or so points profit) and for the last Jumps season (around 650). I shall now revise Fortune Cookies for York and publish at the start of that week.
Meanwhile, in general staking, I’ve reduced the size of my bets for some meetings where you can’t rely on form and stats, where racing is for pinstickers.
My staking plan now relates to meetings which I’m giving the key A: major racing on top-grade tracks; B: other races of class 2 and higher; C: class 3 and 4 on top and medium grade tracks; D class 4 and lower on lesser tracks.
DAILY TARGET: A profit on the day by moderating bets as follows:
BULL’S-EYE NAP (AB): Rare win-50 stakes on horses of single-figure odds.
BULL’S-EYE BET (AB): Outsiders staked to win 50 points
SUPERNAP (AB): 20-point win bets on short-odds horses.
NAP (AB): stakes to win 20 or 30 points, maximum stake 15 points
NAP (CD): stakes to win 10 or 20 points, maximum stakes 12 points
BET (AB): stakes to win 30 points, maximum 15.
BET (CD): stakes to win 10 or 20 points, maximum 12.
There may be some overlap but, generally speaking, the worse the race, the better it is to keep stakes low. Racetrack guide:
Grade 1 (Flat only): Ascot*, Chantilly, the Curragh, Deauville, Goodwood, Newmarket July* and Newmarket Rowley*, Sandown*, York, some Epsom.
Grade 2: Chester, Haydock, Leopardstown, Newbury, some Ayr, some Thirsk, some Newcastle (AW), some Lingfield (AW).
Grade 3: Beverley, Leicester, Musselburgh, Nottingham, Pontefract, Ripon, Redcar, Windsor, Yarmouth.
Grade 4: Bath, Brighton, Carlisle, Catterick, Ffos Las, Hamilton, Salisbury, Warwick, Wetherby.
(Not including AW tracks, except main events at Newcastle and Lingfield).
Punter’s homework: Keep a record of your bets and, at the end of the season, make a chart of where you made most money and in what type of race (I marked my own best tracks with an asterisk, above*), then arrange your stake to relate to profit targets, as I do. Focus stakes where you win; a d at a level which inflicts least damage to the bank.
MOLLS MEMORY BACK IN HER GRADE
3.00 Haydock I chose this race to analyse because it is class 3, and I expected the ground to ease. But the rain does not arrive until tomorrow, according to the weathermen and today is marked ‘zero precipitation.’
Molls Memory, a 3.0 BETDAQ offer, is back in her grade but could do with a drop of rain, though she may have struggled at Windsor on the last day because upped to class 2. Ed Walker, her trainer, is on a hat-trick, after wins in the last two days and her opponents are hard to fancy.
Showers would also be pennies from heaven for Princes Des Sables, a sequence winner last season – four in a row, mainly on an easy surface – who is now down to the mark of her last success, which was a grade higher.
Daffy Jane has won minor races but this looks a tough ask. Isaan Queen is high enough in the handicap and the form that promoted her position in the ratings was largely on AW.
Goodnight Girl won back to back last year at this time but has been a bridesmaid since, raised in the ratings 11lb, some 5lb of that for places, with returns of 223232003.
Seen The Lyte is a course winner but at a lower level with a lower weight in a shorter race (5f).
Summer Daydream has finished stone last the last twice in July and, though a Listed winner, down in the weights as a result, needs to bounce back at a time when her stable has a poor strike rate.
DON’T MISS TOP TRAINERS’ SCHEMES
3.40 Brighton (Challenge Cup) and 7.35 Newcastle Three-year-olds are three out of four, two of them trained by Mark Johnston, who has another one of that age in this Brighton Challenge Cup called Mister Chiang (5.5 offers).
He’s on a hat-trick for Franny Norton, raised a mere 5lb – because he only does what he has to and wins narrowly – and incredibly he’s back a pound lower than for his first success at Chelmsford in December.
Sir Mark Prescott, with 10 winners in a fortnight, and going for a hat-trick today, sends out six runners, including first-time-blinkered Final Rock in this one.
But my man in the long grass tells me that Sir Mark has a hidden horse today in Scheme (a 3.0 offer in the 7.35 Newcastle), form figures 300 but who has had his three maidens and is suddenly stepped up in trip on a track where the stable has a 26% strike rate.
Scheme’s dam is descended from the great US champion, Affirmed, and the easy Wolver surface will suit this son of Pivotal. Could be another Prescott sequence horse.
LATROBE LOOKS A CLASS ABOVE THEM
6.55 Leopardstown (Ballyroan Stakes) The maestro trainers dominate this, with Dermot Weld winning nine, Aidan O’Brien 5 and John Oxx 5. That’s 19 winners split three ways in 28 years.
Weld’s Sea The Stars four-year-old Broad Street is very lightly raced, 2-2 but clearly hard to keep right, and Weld (2-25) – like Oxx (1-14) – currently has a modest strike rate.
For Aidan O’Brien, Blenheim Palace has managed a couple of Group-3 places; Guaranteed is a similar level. But Latrobe (Joseph O’Brien), around even money, has a win and two seconds in Group 1.
Fourth at Royal Ascot and second in the Curragh Cup, a Latrobe success is long overdue but there’s nothing here of the quality of his recent conquerors, Magical and Addeybb.
MOKAMMAL IS A WILLING IMPROVER
7.15 Sandown Dreamweaver has won only in class 5 but is up 8lb so had to come here or take pot luck for a jockey in the Shergar Cup on Saturday. The 8lb is because they bumped up Maronnier 10lb for beating him here at Sandown a month ago.
Just The Man has improved only 3lb in three races, according to the handicapper. Durrell hasn’t really improved at all; he’s tied to a similar horse in Ironclad.
Mubariz has placed in class 3 but his rating has remained 88 or 89 all year. Migration, runner-up in the Esher Cup on today’s track, ran well in the Britannia, but has eased down the handicap again; there was money for him only in class 4.
We’re struggling to find an improver. But the man for the job is Sir Michael Stoute, who has already raised Mokammal’s game from class-6 novice to class 4 and found the gelding a willing helper. I thought 5.5 this morning was generous.
⚠️ Watch your bets: Moktamel runs 8.25 Leopardstown
DAQMAN’S BETS
3.00 Haydock (win 10)
BET 5pts win MOLLS MEMORY
3.40 Brighton (win 10)
BET 2.25pts win MISTER CHIANG
6.55 Leopardstown (supernap)
BET 20pts win LATROBE
7.15 Sandown (win 20)
BET 4.4pts win MOKAMMAL
7.35 Newcastle (win 10)
BET 5pts win SCHEME
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