16 NAPS UP WITH 100-30 WINNER: You can’t keep a good man down! Daqman cantered to winning nap number 16 in a sequence of 24 (all in the first four) with Parsnip Pete (WON 100-30) at Aintree yesterday. The sequence is 111114123131111411211321
5-1 SHOT AMONG THREE IN A ROW: He gave three winners in a row in the space of 15 minutes, jumps and Flat, at Aintree, Longchamp and Wincanton, for a profit of 33 points on the day with..
WON 5-1 PANTXOA
WON 100-30 (nap) PARSNIP PETE
WON 7-4 TAC DE BOISTRON
INTERNATIONAL BIG-RACE DOUBLE: With Adelaide (WON Cox Plate 7-1) in Australia and Tac De Boistron (WON 7-4) in the Prix Royal Oak, France’s all-aged St Leger, Daqman is in fine international fettle for Saturday’s Breeders’ Cup in America. Today he starts to set the scene.
‘NEVER’ AGAIN IN BREEDERS CUP SPRINT
DANK For the umpteenth time, Sir Michael Stoute has so improved a lightly-raced mare that the five-year-old Dank, after only 14 starts, is in line for back-to-back wins in the Breeders Cup Fillies’ And Mares on Saturday night.
Dank has been quiet since storming America last autumn, taking a Grade 1 at Arlington before her success at Santa Anita. Dangerous that the close fourth that day, Emollient, then a three-year-old, has just returned to form on the course with a Grade-1 win.
NO NAY NEVER Remember Wesley Ward’s Scat Daddy colt who won the Norfolk Stakes at Royal Ascot then the Prix Morny at Deauville? He’s just warmed up with a win at Keeneland, perfect timing for the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint.
The same stable’s Undrafted is in the same race. This time you need only take your mind back to Newmarket this summer (the one that’s just been and gone!) when the four-year-old, badly drawn, was beaten less than two lengths by Slade Power in the July Cup.
Ward is also double handed in Friday’s Juvenile Turf with Hootenanny and Luck Of The Kitten. Hootenanny ran second in this year’s Morny to the Wow Signal after winning the Windsor Castle Stakes at Royal Ascot.
FLINTSHIRE Now for a recent memory.. Treve flying home on the far rail for her Arc double. We’ll never know how she would fare in the Breeders Cup Turf.
But we have – literally – the next best thing, the Arc runner-up Flintshire, joint-top rated for the race, alongside Stoute’s Telescope and Aidan O’Brien’s Magician; fourth in, a few pounds behind, Brown Panther. That’s a formidable quartet for Europe.
BLUE REMEMBERED SHROPSHIRE LAD..
If you had commuter problems this morning, think on. Donkeys years ago, you might have had to catch the pony-and-trap ‘bus’ service, had you lived near Telford, Shropshire.
And, had you been a tad generous, you might have tipped the driver, a coal-miner’s son, who usually preferred to ride the ponies.
Today at Leicester, where he had his first winner in 1921, that boy is briefly honoured in the Sir Gordon Richards Handicap (3.30). Gordon the ‘bus’ driver became one of our greatest jockeys, standing alongside – perhaps even in front of – Fred Archer, Steve Donoghue and Lester Piggott, as one of the all-time greats.
Sir Gordon landed 4,870 winners (he was 26 times champion jockey). Only a fellow called McCoy has beaten him for number of winners in a season.
2.30 Leicester An open race with little to choose at the front of the BETDAQ market, early mouse, four horses just 0.8 points apart as I write.
In betting order, I note that Gabrial, Ingleby Angel, God Willing and Music In The Rain have never been placed on a right-handed track like today’s.
David O’Meara is on the oche with three arrows to throw: apart from Ingleby Angel (holds Le Chat d’Or, Our Boy Jack and stablemate Music In The Rain on Haydock form and earlier in front of God Willing), he has Stand My Ground who loves it soft but has to step up from a claimer.
Loving Spirit could be a threat as a recent CD winner, but I shall side with Daniel Tudhope’s selection of the O’Meara trio, Ingleby Angel.
3.30 Leicester (Sir Gordon Richards Handicap) Despite the small field (not a good turnout numerically for £30,000 guaranteed), there’s a bit of an international flavour to this with Charlie Appleby introducing his unbeaten French import, Blue Rambler, and John Joseph Murphy over from Ireland with Cardinal Palace.
Murphy hasn’t been in much form to speak of and his horses have been starting any price (believe it! 16-1, 20-1, 33-1, 50-1, 66-1, even 100-1) yet, on the one occasion recently that the money was down, he scored at Naas with Captain My Captain at 13-2 favourite.
Though the entire field is covered by 5lb on official ratings, this handicap has been stretched to 12lb, and a further edge is the soft ground.
Though, obviously, we need to watch the market, it’s hard to fancy Cardinal Palace, as a Dundalk Polytrack and Bellewstown firm-ground winner, and Shwaiman has been beaten both times he’s run in mud.
Harris Tweed, who once won the John Porter on soft, is down a grade here after a quiet season, mainly in Listed company.
Rewaaya was on the upgrade until slowly away last time. Fattsota returns to his winning distance at Newmarket (July) in August. We’re left with decisions to make.
Can Harris Tweed return to form in this lesser company? Will Rewaaya get away on terms; she has to improve very little at the weights at this time of year? Is Blue Rambler the ‘disguised’ horse, ready to resume winning ways over here?
Early-mouse, the BETDAQ market is strong on Rewaaya but Fattsota, Blue Rambler and Harris Tweed are separated by only 0.9 points within the offers parameter of 4.7 to 5.6, as I write.
I worry that Rewaaya flashed her tail under pressure in the same race that she was slowly away; two signs of temperament? With those three running for me in a solid wall behind her in the market, I’ll try a lay.
Harris Tweed (loss of form) and Blue Rambler (needs soft) have both been given time off for one reason or another. I took 5.5 the Rambler this morning, with Godolphin red-hot with holidayed horses and talking of better things for this one.
NAP (1.20 Ayr) Nicky Richards is in tremendous form, going for a hat-trick after a break since his double at Carlisle last week, and he thinks a good deal of Chidswell.
Chidswell has leapfrogged the paper favourite, Ballybroker Breeze, on BETDAQ this morning but was still a shade of odds against as I tried to revive my banker sequence.
DAQMAN’S BETS (all bets staked to win 20 points, except the nap)
BANKER STAKES: BET 20pts win (nap) CHIDSWELL (1.20 Ayr)
BET 3.5pts win INGLEBY ANGEL (2.30 Leicester)
DOUBLE WHAMMY: LAY 5pts REWAAYA and BET 4.4pts win BLUE RAMBLER (3.30 Leicester)
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