DAQMAN PROFIT EVERY DAY FOR A WHOLE WEEK: Though Daqman’s naps gravy-train hit the buffers yesterday when the gambled-on Duster was only third, his run of profit continued: two more winners made it seven straight days of winning every day.
140 POINTS UP: NOW FOR SUPER SATURDAY? Friday’s winners, Switzerland (WON 2-1) and Surprise Moment (WON 15-8), took his total to 140.28 points. It all started last Saturday with five winners in one day. Can he do it again today?
1.30 Newbury: Watch for this one with bated breath, they tell me. Abated, sister to top sprinter Bated Breath, has leapfrogged the paper favourites to take pole position on BETDAQ this morning and is reportedly a flying machine.
2.00 Newbury (Washington Singer Stakes): While the opener might contain a sprinter with a future, this race can throw up quality, even a Guineas winner (Haafhd 2003), with John Gosden the trainer to follow: three winners in seven years from only four runners.
The Haafhd stable (Just The Judge) takes on Gosden (Excess Knowledge) today, Richard Hannon’s cantering Cheptstow winner, Ninjago, making this a three-way contest.
I can’t bet but I can expect an excess of knowledge about future betting from the outcome of this race.
2.30 Newbury (Geoffrey Freer Stakes): Where are the three-year-olds this year (Dartford is surely only a pacemaker for Masked Marvel)?
Masked Marvel has lost form, dropped 7lb in the ratings since he beat Brown Panther in the 2011 St Leger (and Brown Panther was in front of him at the end of the King George).
The score is 1-1 between Modun and Harris Tweed, who attempts a John Porter/Geoffrey Freer double that’s never been done before.
I’ve never been a Brown Panther man and I can’t believe that a five-year-old (Mount Athos) can take the leap in one race – a Listed full of ‘nearly’ horses last time out – from handicap winner in the Spring to Group 2 today. Not with my mortgage on it anyway.
At least you know that Mount Athos is trying for his life, since he must win this to get into the Melbourne Cup. But, with all the ‘ifs and buts’, and with the revived form of Saeed Bin Suroor, I’ll take a punt on an 11.5 shot in Group-3 winner Modun for a Frankie Dettori flying dismount.
2.20 Ripon Silver Trophy (Great St Wilfrid Consolation): We should be looking for a draw bias which will help us later on in the Great St Wilfrid: traditionally a low-number race, it went to the high stalls last year.
So I need at least one each side in both races from over my cornflakes, knowing that potentially some of my bets may be wasted.
My plan for this Silver Trophy was to hunt out the better-quality (class 2) winners, aged seven or under, and in the highest and lowest half dozen in the stalls (that age barrier corresponds to past results of the Great St Wilfrid itself).
But only Fast Shot (highest ever in the ratings) and Parisian Pyramid (tailed off last time) are qualifiers, and I reckon I need to pick up on improvers aged four, particularly those which ran in the last two weeks (you must have a sprinter in form).
That gives us El Viento, fifth in the Stewards Cup, and L’Ami Louis, lightly raced, and the ‘moral’ at Newmarket, trying to give weight to Trade Secret after seven weeks off the track, a long time for a sprinter.
Also lightly raced is Prodigality – six runs in his life – who has shot up 16lb in two months. I’m rejecting Spinatrix as exposed now after 18 races.
L’Ami Louis has Fran Berry booked but I just worry about that ‘sandwich’ of a middle draw and his need for firm ground, and with El Viento I’m concerned at his poor strike rate.
It all leaves me thinking this race is for the taking by Prodigality, a winner on a sound surface though bred by a soft-ground sire, but 5.4 is not a value jackpot bet, nor is El Viento at 11.5, given the benefit of the doubt as a previous Ripon winner.
3.30 Ripon (Great St Wilfrid): Six of the last seven winners had been in the frame in the previous fortnight or beaten less than three lengths in a major sprint, including three in the Stewards’ Cup or it’s consolation Stewards’ Sprint.
That gives you Es Que Love, Alben Star, Louis The Pious, Johannes, Lexi’s Hero and Bosun Breese, with the first two of those close up at Goodwood.
Three of the last four winners had already scored at Ripon, which nominates Pepper Lane (won this race last year), Johannes, Singeur, Bosun Breese and Elusive Prince.
Four-year-olds have massively the best record: Alben Star, Louis The Pious, Seal Rock, Lexi’s Hero, Elusive Prince, Bertiewhittle, Barnet Fair.
Common to two of the three stats are Alben Star (stall 3), Bosun Breese (2), Elusive Prince (8), Johannes (17), Lexi’s Hero (20) and Louis The Pious (7), with the pair in the middle stalls – 7 and 8 – rejected, and Bosun Breese considered a 5f horse.
With the Ripon horse Elusive Prince in a no-man’s land stall, I shall take his stablemate Bertiewhittle (stall 1 and 13.0 on BETDAQ), disguised because he’s run on heavy and over 7f.
Alben Star, offered at 10.0 and near him in stall 3, must go well, with the pace on that low side, including from Lexi’s Hero.
But ‘Lexi’ points up his stablemate Our Jonathan, in an adjacent stall and running in a handicap for the first time since he won the Ayr Gold Cup. His 13.5 offers are the best value in the race for a horse that narrowly failed – by a neck – to catch Group-3 winner and Group-2 placed Libranno, who runs in the 3.05 Group 2 at Newbury this afternoon.
DAQMAN’S BETS
BET 8.6pts win (nap) ABATED (1.30 Newbury)
BET 4.5pts win PRODIGALITY and 1.9pts win EL VIENTO (2.20 Ripon)
BET 1.3pts win MODUN and 0.5pts win (stakes saver) MOUNT ATHOS (2.30 Newbury)
WIN-30 JACKPOT: BET 3.3pts win ALBEN STAR, and 2.5pts win on each OUR JONATHAN and BERTIEWHITTLE (3.30 Ripon)
* Daqman’s selections are backed to win 20 points (unless otherwise stated in jackpot bets) so, if you divide 20 by his stake, you know the Betdaq offer taken at the time of writing.
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