FLAT OUT FOR WINNERS! START WITH A 15.5 OUTSIDER: They’re off! The Flat season starts today in Ireland with the Irish Lincolnshire and on Saturday it’s the Lincoln Handicap at Doncaster. What better to launch a new season than a 15.5 big-race BETDAQ outsider on the opening day at Naas.
THE JUMPS RACE IS OVER: DAQMAN DECLARES AT 45-22: No point in prolonging the agony for Pricewise. Daqman has hammered him 45-22 over Jumps so far (profit: Daqman +34 Pricewise +3). Even if the Racing Post man won every race at Aintree, he’d still be beaten. Let’s give him another chance by starting again on the Flat today.
WINNERS? DAQMAN’S THE NAME: BETDAQ’S THE GAME: Daqman made 50 points profit with his first two bets yesterday, both pointing up the advantage of getting on early exchange prices: you are a better bettor with BETDAQ offers.
WON 9-2 CHIC NAME (from 8.2 taken on BETDAQ)
WON 9-2 WINSTON C (from 6.8 taken on BETDAQ)
DAWN OF A NEW FLAT SEASON
1.30 Naas In the days of Dawn Approach (won this in 2012), Jim Bolger landed a hat-trick in this first two-year-old turf race on these islands.
Since then two fillies have won it, getting a 5lb concession from the colts. And there are two fillies only in today’s race, both daughters of Dawn Approach himself.
Gentleman Jim saddles Feminista (11.0 BETDAQ), seemingly better drawn than Adrian Keatley’s Capel At Dawn. Both Naas runnings of this race since it moved from the Curragh have been won by the low three stalls, both on soft-heavy.
Brendan Duke, who saddled the 20-1 winner a year ago from stall three, has the exact same draw this time around for the Garswood grey, Value Chain (10.0 offers). Owner? Mrs J S Bolger.
RYAN MOORE v RUBY WALSH
2.00 Naas The first of the early-bird all-aged maidens that we use to try to assess Aidan O’Brien’s turf form.
He’s striking at 40% with just a handful of runners on AW (2-5) and has won this race three times, including at handy 7-1 and 8-1 SPs.
Ryan Moore crosses the Irish Sea to partner his Empire State, autumn form figures 223, beaten a head, then a neck and finally a short-neck, two on turf, one on AW. Bridesmaid with one hand on the bouquet three times!
It’s not often you see Ruby Walsh – riding Castletownsend for father Ted – in the same race as Moore, Kevin Manning and Seamie Heffernan. No worries, Ruby: there isn’t a last fence or hurdle on the run-in. In fact, it’s all of it a ‘run in’: it’s a six-furlong sprint!
This is another good race for early-bird Jim Bolger – he’s won it twice since 2013 – and he saddles yet another Dawn Approach (dam’s sire Gone West), adequately called Western Dawn. Owner? Mrs J S Bolger.
MUCH ADO ABOUT HEE HAW
2.35 Naas (Naas Racecourse Launches the 2019 Irish Flat Season Handicap) It’s a bit Irish telling us that when the season is already two races old! And you might think I’m also a bit of a donkey, tipping outsider Hee Haw (BETDAQ 9.2 taken).
But his trainer, Ado McGuinness, who has won this race twice (2015-16), is in fabulous form with 11 AW winners this year, four of them in the last week.. in which time he has a 100% place strike rate: 111213.
EXPECTING A RAIDER TO WIN
3.05 Naas There are two rules about three-year-olds, rules that are born of each other:
ONE: Last year was last year; this year is this (in other words, don’t expect two-year-old form to carry forward).
TWO: Never bet in a three-year-olds’ handicap until Derby time.
So let’s break the rules together, shall we? Just a tiny stake on Richard Fahey’s raider from England, Wasntexpectingthat.
He was third in a massive field for a Weatherbys sales race last autumn (gelded since) and is weighted to have a go. Take the 15.0 on BETDAQ and just grin smugly when your punting pal says: Wasn’texpectingthat!
FIRST FLAT SUPERNAP FOR GOLD
3.40 Naas (Park Express Stakes) This Group 3 would be serious betting business if, that is, we didn’t know another rule of the Early Bird game, which explains why no outright favourite has won this in the decade, and why we even had a 100-1 scorer four years ago.
Golden rule for Group races in the Spring: trainers who know their animal hasn’t much chance of winning the main events will prepare him early to try to grab a big prize from underneath the form radar.
Highly skilled at this are D Weld and the same J S Bolger (two apiece in this event in the last 10 seasons). You need something that goes well fresh.
Form after a break: Yulong Gold Fairy 1121. Trainer? Dermot Weld. Irish 1,000 Guineas fifth and loves soft ground.
SHATHARAAT NEEDS A PAY DAY
4.10 Naas (Irish Lincolnshire) I’ve mentioned the draw but not the dreaded words ‘heavy’ or even ‘soft’. You get to combine these advantages with Shatharaat (from gate 2). A winner only of his maiden is always a negative but was the overnight gamble.
Shatharaat is on a massive redemption mission. Bought for 1,200 guineas last May, won the Listowel maiden, then made e120,000 at Goffs Champion Sales.
Shatharaat, 12.5 on BETDAQ this morning, likes to front-run, from what we’ve seen of him.
So, too, Honor Oak (from the one stall): made all in a bog at the Galway festival but is 10lb higher and seven now, so may be hauled in.
Ger Lyons hasn’t had a winner from 14 starters this year which puts you off Karawaan (out of 3), of which Jim Crowley said after their Chelmsford win in August, 2017: ‘The ground was too soft last time.’
Here’s the in-form Ado McGuinness again with Master Speaker (6). Easy to win with Ado but hard to win with this horse. Flat Turf strike rate? 1-53.
Master Speaker is aged nine but the best of the veterans is surely stablemate Aussie Valentine, who has been placed in this race four times.
Leader of three for Richard Fahey (currently 0-10) may be soft-ground winner Crownthorpe but the handicapper won’t give an ounce since he won at Ripon last Spring (nine defeats since).
Warnaq is also paying for three Flat winners, one on heavy, and one here at Naas in November. Up another 9lb but could be hard to collar if he gets the lead.
Theobald (3-4 at Dundalk), and ran in last year’s Irish Derby, and is too big at 15.5. Gavin Cromwell’s recent Dundalk winner, Ciao, is another AW form horse with a big chance, despite her penalty.
MODIGLIANI IN THE FRAME?
4.45 Naas If you can’t find the early winners, here’s another game to play: how many times will Aidan O’Brien tell us of his runner: ‘He’s just ready to start off’?
More points if you can match up one of those with the trainer’s words after the race: ‘Listen, we always knew he was a good horse.’
This usually comes in explanation as to why Aidan is already being interviewed while the rest of the field is still finishing the ‘race’.
It could happen today as Amedeo Modigliani ‘is ready to start off’ after 596 days’ absence, since his third to Gustav Klimt then a winner at the Galway Festival in August 2017 made him favourite for the 2018 Derby. Not seen since, but ‘listen..’
DAQMAN’S BETS
1.30 Naas (win 10)
BET 1pt win FEMINISTA
Bet 1pt win VALUE CHAIN
2.00 Naas (win 10, win 30)
BET 4pts win EMPIRE STATE
BET 1pt win and place WESTERN DAWN
2.35 Naas (win 20)
BET 2.25pts win HEE HAW
3.05 Naas (win 20)
BET 1.5pts win and place WASNTEXPECTINGTHAT
3.40 Naas (supernap)
BET 20pts win YULONG GOLD FAIRY
4.10 Naas (win 50)
BULL’S-EYE BET: 4.25pts win SHATHARAAT
BULL’S-EYE BET: 3.5pts win THEOBALD
4.45 Naas (win 10)
BET 5.5pt win MODIGLIANI
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