PLACE RETURNS BUT BULL’S-EYE TREASURE JUST OUT OF REACH: Third race lucky today? Daqman has tried three bets at Carlisle on Thursday and Cheltenham yesterday (two in the same race) to win 50 points in the first of his bull’s-eye bets over jumps, utilising huge offers on BETDAQ. All have been placed, two of them winning money:
2ND 7-1 THE BIG GALLOPER (2nd and 3rd same race yesterday)
3RD 16-1 TREASURE DILLON (w/p at 25.0 on BETDAQ)
4TH 11-2 IOLANI (w/p at 9.6 on BETDAQ on Thursday)
ACCOUNTS UPDATE: DAQMAN 953 POINTS CLEAR
Daqman 79, Pricewise 36 (Daqman + 318, Pricewise – 635 to 10pt stakes)
Bulls-eye naps (8-16) 50% (256pts profit to recommended stakes)
Supernaps (24-41) 59% (49pts profit to 20-point stake)
TOP JUMPS RACING SURVIVES A BATTLE WITH THE WEATHER: Racing at Doncaster and Newbury were cancelled this morning, the tracks waterlogged after heavy rain. Monday’s meeting at Redcar has also been abandoned. That still leaves a weekend of top Jumps racing at Cheltenham today and Aintree tomorrow. Headlines:
MOGUL’S PHANTOM FUTURITY
LET’S ROCK AT CHELTENHAM
SEEKING 6.0 THE PIMPERNEL
NEWLAND IMPROVER AT 15.0
EYES RIGHT FOR A BIG PUNT
MOGUL’S PHANTOM FUTURITY
It’s the race that never was. The Doncaster Futurity Trophy was reduced to a farce when all bar one of the probables was trained by Aidan O’Brien. Now it’s rained off.
The Futurity ’exercise gallop’ for Ballydoyle and the rest of the Doncaster card was cancelled this morning because of the waterlogged Town Moor track.
Word was that Mogul, a dual winner including the Leopardstown Champion Juvenile six weeks ago, was the Derby horse among the O’Brien colts and, during the week, his odds crashed into second favourite for Epsom behind Pinatubo, as if he’d already won this phantom Futurity.
LET’S ROCK AT CHELTENHAM
2.00 Cheltenham Philip Hobbs, who won this race four years in a row (2011-14), has seen his Rock The Kasbah backed in the week, as a winner over further on today’s Old Course, when he comfortably held Cogry. Royal Vacation was second on today’s terms.
There has also been a move for Royal Vacation’s stablemate West Approach but he’s a difficult horse to win with. He took the Long Walk Hurdle last December but his two chase wins came in small fields two years ago, and Team Tizzard is firing only on one cyclinder right now.
The Young Master, Kim Muir third and Sandown Gold Cup runner-up when West Approach was behind, does all his winning at this time of year but, like Cogry, is a double-figure age now. No horse over nine has won this in the decade, and his stable currently has a poor strike-rate.
The more rain the better for Back To The Thatch, an excellent second over further at Haydock last winter. His yard landed a hat-trick a few days ago; he looks tempting off a light weight, and his falls over fences have come when tiring towards the end of marathon attempts.
BETDAQ BULLS-EYE-VALUE: I took 13.0 Rock The Kasbah and 16.5 Back To The Thatch.
SEEKING 6.0 THE PIMPERNEL
2.35 Cheltenham Who can follow in the hoofprints of Dodging Bullets and Tiger Roll, both winners of this four-year-old hurdles test since 2012?
Co Meath trainer John McConnell, who won it last year with a lightweight, has another in here below 11st 2lb (they are 7 out of 10 in the decade): Construct, given a prep run on the Flat three weeks back.
Peter Fahey also comes over from Ireland with a big chance. Well backed Soviet Pimpernel was odds on in a 14-runner race at Gowran, earning plaudits from trainer and racereaders alike.
Kaizer has been winning his races – Flat and Jumps – by ever-increasing margins, and is another outsider that ‘could be anything.’
In hindsight Havingagoodtime was entitled to win by a street on the New Course here last Spring, now that we know that the form meant nothing.
Fanfan Du Seuil is dropped in class after failing to make his mark in graded events at the Cheltenham and Aintree festivals last Spring. Stable out of form.
Of the topweights, Quel Destin was five in a row from this time last season until he faded into fifth, trying to make all in the Triumph Hurdle. Paul Nicholls’ runners have been disappointing this week.
Torpillo (likes it testing) cruised home at Chepstow. He and Soviet Pimpernel have been the money horses with the bookies but I could still get 6.0 the Pimpernel on BETDAQ at 8.30 a.m.
NEWLAND IMPROVER AT 15.0
3.10 Cheltenham Decent young chasers win this – the likes of Fox Norton and Paul Nicholls’ Modus – with nine-year-olds and upwards failing to score. Nicholls has Brelan d’As making his third attempt to win outside novice class.
He’s beaten only five horses home in chases, slow-run small-field affairs on the gaffe tracks; so he still has something to prove for me. So does the stable this week!
Saint Calvados, too, has won only small-field races but with a difference: there’s been a Grade 2 and a Grade 3 among them, and he was third in the Ladbrokes Dublin Chase (Grade 1) in February.
He’s had wind surgery during the summer break, and has won in deep ground. The snag is his poor form at Cheltenham. Two runs, recording 40.
Maybe the hill caught him out for a breathing problem, and he deserves a chance after his wind op.
Dr Richard Newland beat my two Cheltenham bull’s-eye bets with Duke Street yesterday, and McGroarty has gradually climbed the chasing ranks from a mark of 120 a year ago to 152 today, with six wins out of 10 still standing.
The stable won this race in 2015 with a horse of the same age and weight to the nearest pound. Proved the pundits – and his trainer – all wrong when he won on the soft on the last day, after his career had been steered only to sound surfaces, so there may yet be more to come.
BETDAQ BULL’S-EYE VALUE: McGroarty looked huge at 15.0 this morning. Saver: Saint Calvados.
EYES RIGHT FOR A BIG PUNT
3.45 Cheltenham The Pertemps Final runner-up last March, Tobefair has drifted in the rain, off 13lb higher.
Gunfleet’s success goes back to the 2017-18 season and the gamble at Stratford on his return early this month went astray, but he ran on well (the race was shorter than today) and his stable is in good form.
Aye Right has done well. He’s a Yeats out of a Presenting mare so should stay all day: 11 times in the frame (six wins) from 13 starts.
BETDAQ BULL’S -EYE VALUE: I fancied the 7.6 offers still available in the BETDAQ orange after Theclockisticking came out.
DAQMAN’S BETS
2.00 Cheltenham (win-50 bull’s-eye bets)
BET 4pts win ROCK THE KASBAH
BET 3.25pts win BACK TO THE THATCH
2.35 Cheltenham (win 30, win 10)
BET 6pts win SCARLET PIMPERNEL
BET 6pts win TORPILLO
3.10 Cheltenham (win 30, win 10)
BET 2pts win and place McGROARTY
BET 3.3pts win SAINT CALVADOS
3.45 Cheltenham (win-50 bull’s-eye nap)
BET 7.5pts win AYE RIGHT
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