16-1 WINNER WAS 30.0 ON BETDAQ: Daqman scored a sensational opening one-two at Punchestown yesterday with the winner and second, both at 16-1, paying 255-1 the forecast with Ladbrokes, Elusive Ivy to beat The Brock Inn, with Elusive Ivy tipped at 30.0 on BETDAQ.
10-1 SCORER IN DOUBLE WHAMMY: Daqman struck again in the Ladbrokes Champion Stayers Hurdle, laying the hot favourite, Alpha Des Obeaux, who was third, and tipping the 10-1 winner, One Track Mind (from 12.5 on BETDAQ), in a dramatic Double Whammy.
122 POINTS PROFIT IN PUNCHESTOWN WEEK: That put him streets ahead of his Racing Post rival, Pricewise, as he took his haul to 14 winning bets for 122 points profit in the three days of the big festival at Punchestown.
21 UP ON PRICEWISE: 15 LAYS OUT OF 16: It’s now Daqman 21, Pricewise 7, and 15 winning lays out of 16 (around 94% strike rate); the lays are 2-2 in this great winning week:
WON 16-1 Elusive Ivy, win and place (from BETDAQ 30)
WON 16-1 Maio Chinn Tire, win and place
WON 10-1 One Track Mind, win and place (from BETDAQ 12.5)
WON 9-1 God’s Own (from 14.0 BETDAQ)
WON 11-4 Mizzou (nap)
WON 2-1 Bellshill
WON (lay) Alpha Des Obeaux (3rd evens favourite)
WON (lay) Supasundae (unplaced 15-8 favourite)
2nd 16-1 The Brock Inn, win and place (from 21.0 BETDAQ)
2nd 7-1 Ancient Sands, win and place (from 14.0 BETDAQ)
WON 1-2 Kreb’s Cycle
THE GREAT BETDAQ CHAMPION HURDLE DUEL
5.30 Betdaq Punchestown Champion Hurdle (ABC Guide) It’s the old order, represented by My Tent Or Yours, versus the ‘new Annie Power’, Vroum Vroum Mag.
That’s what I called her before she won the Mares’ Hurdle at the Cheltenham festival, but we didn’t expect her to have to prove it just yet. Here’s how today’s Betdaq-sponsored title race stacks up:
A: Placed in the Cheltenham Champion Hurdle
B: Aged five, six or seven (unless a previous winner)
C: Only one or two starts that year
D: 3-1 or shorter SP (morning market forecast)
E: Trained Willie Mullins
ACD My Tent Or Yours
Six out of seven hurdles wins before going down to Jezki when running too headstrong in the 2014 Cheltenham Champion Hurdle but had The New One and Hurricane Fly behind.
Jezki would go on to complete the double in this Punchestown Champion Hurdle, lifting the crown from Hurricane Fly, the winner here four years running.
After almost two years off, My Tent Or Yours made so nearly a dream return when second to Annie Power for the Cheltenham championship. Has been first or second 15 times in 16 starts, and is the mandarin of the party today.
BCDE Vroum Vroum Mag
When Annie Power switched to this year’s Cheltenham Champion Hurdle (and won it), Vroum Vroum was left to dominate the Mares’ Hurdle in which stablemate Quevega had reigned for six seasons.
Now Vroum Vroum has to step into Annie Power’s hoofprints (she is not fit enough to run) as supersub for a Mullins championship double. To my reckoning it would be the first Champion Hurdle double for the same stable saddling different mares.
BC Identity Thief
Owners McManus (My Tent Or Yours) and Ricci (Annie Power, Vroum Vroum Mag, Sempre Medici) had the Gigginstown Stud hope, Identity Theft, up to 19 lengths behind them in the Cheltenham Champion Hurdle, and he has to bounce back to – and improve on – his Fighting Fifth form of February, when he seemed to be going the right way to the top.
Delete Cheltenham (unsuitable course?) and heavy ground, and Identity Thief is 2-2 since his third as favourite over a trip too far at this Punchestown festival a year ago. But trainer Henry de Bromhead is having a poor run of form.
BE Sempre Medici
Stretched clear of Identity Thief at the Fairyhouse Grand National meeting last April but, after travelling like a dream to the 2m marker, his stamina gave out behind Nichols Canyon in the Champion Novice Hurdle at this Punchestown meeting.
Has done well in Graded events since but pulled up behind Annie Power and My Tent Or Yours at Cheltenham.
C Fethard Player
Showed his liking for a sound surface when runner-up in the County Hurdle at Cheltenham. Since he was giving weight to the winner, he could be regarded as ‘the moral.’ His form since David Mullins has taken the mount is 212, in which time he’s gone up 11lb in the ratings.
C Ted Veale
Unseated here in the Guinness Chase on Wednesday, and has not won a hurdle race since the County Hurdle at Chelternham in March, 2013
He was at his peak that year when runner-up to Jezki in the Champion Novice Hurdle at this meeting.
VERDICT: I can’t remember a championship meeting at Cheltenham, Aintree or Punchestown where I have more confidence in handicap outsiders than I do about the favourites in the title-race markets.
It is fascinating to see today’s clash, with My Tent Or Yours 8lb higher in the ratings but the versatile Vroum Vroum Mag getting a 7lb mares’ allowance.
In fact, Vroum Vroum Mag is second reserve for this. She deputises for Annie Power who, in turn – as at Cheltenham – was coming off the bench because Faugheen was injured.
The form says Mag has to improve a lot. The runner-up in her Mares Hurdle, Rock On the Moor, has won only her maiden; the third, Legacy Gold, was beaten 68 lengths in the stayers’ race yesterday, and the fourth has won only a class-3 handicap.
There’s a bit of redemption from Jennies Jewel, whom Vroum Vroum beat at Ascot. Jennie was second in the stayers to One Track Mind yesterday, but she had won only a minor four-horse hurdle since taking a handicap in November, 2013, and is unlikely to be an improver at the age of nine.
My conclusion is that I’d rather back Vroum Vroum Mag for next year’s Mares Hurdle at Cheltenham than for this BETDAQ Punchestown Champion Hurdle today, but then only if Annie Power is missing because Faugheen is missing…
Nicky Henderson captures the punting moment exactly: ‘It all hinges on how much attempting the Cheltenham-Aintree double has affected My Tent.’ That translates as: ‘The mare can’t beat us if we’re right.’
I’m not paid to sit at the table and pass, hoping the river card gets me out of trouble. I have to call early.
And, since My Tent has had only two runs back, albeit testing ones, and the Mag form is not as vroum vroum as we were carried away to believe, I am pinning myself down, pegged out with My Tent to beat my favourite mare!
He’s 3.0 in the BETDAQ orange this morning, so I’m just going to try to win 20 from a 10-point bet. No banker.
No Lay. No double whammy. No heroics from me, but hoping for some from the duellists in this great BETDAQ championship spectacle.
BOY! WHAT A TURNAROUND AT THE WEIGHTS
4.20 Punchestown Winners in this at 11-1, 12-1 (twice) and 20-1, with no outright favourite scoring for six years, suggest another tilt at the layers.
With rain and storm forecast, I note that success carrying more than 11st has come on good ground, with one exception. It’s unlikely to be good today.
The stables of Henry de Bromhead, Tony Martin, Sandra Hughes, Thomas Foley and Michael Hourigan are all badly out of form, and early-mouse backers couldn’t find any alternative to the top two in the handicap, with Marlbrook favourite over Avant Tout for no good reason.
That takes me straight to Balnagon Boy (14.0 BETDAQ offers), who was about the equal of Marlbrook at Fairyhouse – gave 4lb, beaten 3.5 lengths – but is now 26lb better off, taking Jonathan Moore’ s claim into account.
If the rain has stayed away, we also need to be on Full Shift’s side at 11.0 for J P McManus. Ran an excellent race on fastish ground at Cheltenham.
BONNY KATE LOOKS VERY HARD TO CATCH
4.55 Punchestown Emily Gray is holding this handicap up, with only one other within a stone of her.
It means that she’s giving 28lb to Ebony Express, who was only a couple of lengths off Emily when falling at the last at Fontwell at the backend of 2015.
Ebony Express, for the burgeoning Neil Mulholland yard, is 18.5 on BETDAQ this morning, with Emily Gray 8.0, which tells it all. I think Punchestown will suit Ebony, but we don’t want a downpour.
Mulholland also runs the lightly-raced Centasia, who is closely matched with Cresswell Breeze who, in turn, was leading Ebony Express when falling at Cheltenham.
Bonny Kate is as versatile as Vroum Vroum Mag! She made all at Limerick over 2m 6f and here at Punchestown over 3m 4f, and was made favourite for the Irish National but the race came too soon.
I think she deserves to be 6.4 favourite over Solita (up in trip and raised 10lb), who has looked more like a two-miler. It could be a case of catch her if you can.
O O SEVEN: LICENSED TO PRINT MONEY..
6.05 Punchestown (Champion Novice) I started so I’ll finish: can a mare (in this case, filly still) beat the boys? Does Jer’s Girl have the vroum vroum?
She’s already beaten the older mares at Fairyhouse, and she gets a massive allowance of 18lb here.
But the last time (2009) a four-year-old tried to win this, it was a gelding straight from winning the Grade 2 at the Aintree Festival, getting 9lb but beaten eight lengths.
I prefer to dutch the pair who were found out by the Cheltenham gradients in the Neptune, O O Seven and Thomas Hobson, both on 9.8 in another miraculous BETDAQ orange: 102% overround. Make your BETDAQ Champion Hurdle day a value day. On BETDAQ.
DAQMAN BETS (staked to win 20, unless otherwise stated)
BULL’S-EYE BET (win 50): 5pts win FULL SHIFT, and 3.8pts win and place BALNAGON BOY (4.20 Punchestown)
BET 10pts win (nap) MY TENT OR YOURS (5.30 Punchestown)
BET (to win 30): 5.5pts win BONNY KATE, and 1.7pts win and place EBONY EXPRESS (4.55 Punchestown)
BET 2.2pts win on each O O SEVEN and THOMAS HOBSON (6.05 Punchestown)
£25 IN FREE BETS
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