FIVE NAPS OUT OF SIX WORTH 282 POINTS: Enable landed Daqman his fifth winning nap from the last six yesterday for a 20-point level stakes profit of 282 points in the six days
WON 2-1 SILENT ECHO
WON 6-4 CHURCHILL (banker)
WON 9-1 WINTER
WON 4-7 HAVANA GREY
WON 2-1 ENABLE
HE NAMED ENABLE AT 25-1 FOR THE OAKS: Daqman also picked El Astronaute (WON 2-1) but Enable was the value coup of the day, tipped at the start of his Early Bird horses-to-follow column when 25-1 for the Oaks. The Early Bird’s ninth winner is now 7.8 with BETDAQ for Epsom.
18-5 UP ON PRICEWISE FOR DAY TWO: Daqman tells you more about Enable today and squares up to Pricewise 18-5 up and 34 points clear before the 1.50 and 3.00 on Day 2 at Chester this afternoon.
GEAR CHANGES ENABLE HER..
Yes, I liked the way Enable quickened. But my eyes grew stalks the way she quickened AGAIN! She and her sole challenger came nine lengths clear of the Cheshire Oaks field yesterday.
Frankie Dettori had asked Enable to step on it and shake off Aidan O’Brien’s Alluringly fully two furlongs out which she did.
But, remarkably, she changed gear and quickened a second time when he asked her, barely perceptibly, to lengthen coming to the distance. That’s supreme Classic quality.
‘What about the first string, Shutter Speed?’ asked ITV’s man immediately after the race, as if the ITV team hadn’t seen their own replay.
No, said racing-manager Teddy Grimthorpe, it was Enable who was the stayer and would go to Epsom, and Shutter Speed was more suited to the two-furlongs-shorter Prix Diane (French Oaks).
That’s music to the ears of Early Bird watchers who saw Enable nominated in this column when 25-1 for the Epsom Classic.
You can now get only 6-1 with Ladbrokes and Corals, 7.8 on BETDAQ. Those who grabbed the 25s can lay off or use their ‘overs’ to back another filly on the day.
The only one I fear at this stage is Rhododendron – another Early Bird – but (check out yesterday’s list) there are still one or two likely lasses in next week’s Musidora trial at York.
Ballydoyle has a private Derby gallop today. It’s called the Chester Vase. Four horses owned by The Lads and trained Aidan O’Brien make up half the field.
But, unless one of them takes a big step forward, I still think Cliffs Of Moher is the Ballydoyle number one for Epsom. Another Early Bird. Another Chester trial. Another day, tomorrow.
Meanwhile, can the O’Brien quartet do a 1-2-3 or ‘get beat’ in the Vase today? Let’s look at each race as a betting proposition..
BETDAQ IS 100% IN YOUR FAVOUR
1.50 Chester My garden got an overnight soak but too late to save Wincanton, and Chester was probably too far North for the rain so would have had watering for the third day in succession.
However, times were slow yesterday, apart from the sprint, and the only one inconvenienced in the opener may be Parish Boy but he hardly takes anything out of most bookies’ books at 34.0.
However, take him out of the BETDAQ orange, and you were betting in a 100-100 level playing-field. In fact, the first four races were a maximum of 105% overound. Punter friendly, or what!
Three winners made all the running yesterday and Berkshire will probably make a bold attempt to do the same in this one.
The trip looks a bit short for Gabrial’s King. Mistiroc is high in the handicap. And Mark Johnston (Sennockian Star) is on a losing run of 27.
So it’s a question of whether Berkshire can give the weight to Khairaat and Brorocco, with both their yards in peak form.
Khairaat had to be driven out at Doncaster to win a class 3 in slow time, and you would be betting on Sir Michael Stoute to improve him quickly.
Brorocco’s Epsom win was in the City And Suburban. The last two winners of that have gone on to score in this race today.
So he’s already made the grade to this class-2 level and is twice the price of Khairaat. I took 4.6, assuming that Berkshire’s early pace cracks most of them, with Khairaat forced to lie up with him from stall one.
STOUTE CAN HAVE THE LAST WORD
2.25 Chester The big three in this race – Stoute (3), Gosden (2) and O’Brien have shared six from 10 – are the first three in the betting.
Deauville, front-running second in the Gordon Richards Stakaes at Sandown on his reappearance, is a leader or a tracker, well suited both to Chester ands firmish ground.
Royal Artillery may be better than his five lengths off Deauville that day. He’s a big horse, lightly raced, which means he probably has more strengthening to do but a big horse is not always going to negotiate these Chester bends too well and all depends on where Dettori has him in the straight
This is hardly the track to be confident in Gabrial, who has dwelt on his last two starts.
Again you can knock the overound down to 100-100 by deleting the rag, Snoano, who has to leap several grades and prefers cut in the ground.
The horse that outran Deauville in the Gordon Richards Stakes was Ulysees, trained by Sir Michael Stoute, who therefore knows all about him for the attempt by Poet’s Word to step up from handicap company and take his first race in the Pattern. I grabbed 4.0.
IT’S A GREY DAY FOR LUCKY JIM
3.00 Chester Via Egnatia made all and stormed clear – seven lengths and six lengths – in his maiden. With a run under his belt, he could do the same here.
What more do you want than the one stall and cheeky pace-counter Frankie Dettori doing the steering!
The question is whether that runaway win affected his handicap mark and whether, in consequence, he’s up to giving weight away to all bar the top one.
That top one, Masham Star, looks exposed and the stable is out of form but he could be troublesome early to Via Egantia (made all at Newcastle in November, successfully giving a stone to Aventinus).
The grey Mutawatheb also goes with the pace. He was hampered when Mailshot had already shot clear at Chelmsford on the last day and I like t he way he battled back to score at Doncaster in October.
It will be clever training if Richard Fahey can move Areen Heart up two grades from his class-4 Beverley second when most racereaders thought he wouldn’t go by and needed blinkers.
I took 6.0 Mutawatheb, relying on champion Jim Crowley, with the trainer a bit worried about the track.
COUNT YOUR CASH AT BETDAQ 16.5
3.35 Chester Vase It would be ironic if Treasure Beach’s close relative, Count Octave, ‘stuffs’ Ballydoyle’s quartet!
Treasure Beach was the The Lads’ Irish derby winner who won this Vase as his prep race!
On the early ratings, the son of Frankel has more than a stone to find with another Frankel, Cunco, who won the Sandown Classic Trial.
But both are reckoned inferior at this stage to The Anvil, a Galileo who comes to this race off 109, though the O’Brien jockey bookings suggest that’s he’s third or fourth choice today.
Another Galileo, Venice Beach (Ryan Moore), half-brother to a King George and Arc winner, is festooned with aids (tongue strap, cheekpieces). Call me old fashioned but I don’t like to see that in a Classic colt (the stats bear me out).
And Finn McCool, wearing first-time cheekpieces, was only seventh behind Rivet in the Racing Post Trophy, which has been proved the weakest of the top two-year-old tests last season.
That leaves Wings Of Eagles for O’Brien, son of Derby winner Pour Moi, but with a lot to prove ( behind Cunco twice last season).
Tamleek won well at Newmarket and is a big horse who should improve, though whether he’s right for for the Chester bends is another matter.
As I’ve said I’m waiting on another day (tomorrow) for my O’Brien horse. The obvious one here is Cunco but I shall have a bit on County Octave, too big at 15.5.
DAQMAN’S BETS (staked to win 20)
BET 5.5pts win (nap) BROROCCO (1.50 Chester)
BET 6.5pts win POET’S WORD (2.25 Chester)
BET 4pts win MUTAWATHEB (3.00 Chester)
BET 4pts win CUNCO, and 1.35pts win and place COUNT OCTAVE (3.35 Chester)
EARLY BIRD: Deauville (2.25 Chester)
Did you know that as well as checking the realtime prices on BETDAQ below – you can also log into your account and place your bets directly into BETDAQ from BETDAQ TIPS.
