NOW IT’S SEVEN NAPS OUT OF NINE: Daqman’s best-bets profit reached 298 to a notional 20 win on each when Call The Cops, trading around evens on BETDAQ in the morning, landed a gamble and the third banker in the sequence of seven naps up out of nine:
WON 6-1 ANIPA
2nd 11-4 Pearl Princess (beaten a nose)
WON 4-5 PROVIDENT SPIRIT (banker)
WON 1-1 TOORMORE (banker)
WON 2-1 LITIGANT
WON 5-1 SEA SHANTY
0 6-1 Specialagent Alfie
WON 7-4 TOKYO JAVILEX
WON 4-11 CALL THE COPS (banker)
383-1 DOUBLE BID AT EPSOM: Sentiment doesn’t fill your wallet in the racing game, warns Daqman, but he can’t resist a single-point pot at an old-fashioned double that’s back in the big time at Epsom today: the Great Met and City And Suburban. His horses multiply out to a best return of around 383-1.
TOMORROW: SANDOWN GOLD CUP ABC GUIDE: Daqman produced the shock 29.0 runner-up in the Irish National thriller from the top of his ABC Guide. Tomorrow he tries the same stats-and-facts test on Saturday’s Sandown Gold Cup.
DAY THE DERBY TRAINER REFUSED TO PAY HIS TAXI FARE
Today’s punt revives memories of my Uncle Joe. In the days of innocence, this small boy would wait on the corner of the street, a scribbled bettng-slip twisted round his invalid uncle’s piece of silver. He’d told me: ‘Give this to Teddy, the taxi-driver.’
I was never quite sure whether it was my good deed for the day or whether I was condemning Joe – and myself – to the fires of hell (my grandfather was a Methodist preacher).
In any case, I could blame Teddy, who would spot my school blazer and slow down to receive the wager on his way into town.
I was redeemed by my innocence until the day Uncle Joe thrust an extra coin and the old Sporting Life my way before asking me to repeat the errand and said: ‘Go on, pick something out for yourself!’
Always a greedy lad (why cut a cake into slices when it’s called a sandwich), I wrote out a Great Met and City And Suburban double.
Calling in on my way back from school, I was given my first taste of bottled beer, curious at the cause for celebration until Joe and Teddy burst out laughing and put a wad of pound notes in my top pocket: ‘Your two won!”
Incidentally, that ‘devil’ Teddy became forever an angel, once a bigger mission in life revealed itself a couple of years later. He got to know a famous trainer, as his taxi-driver from the station to the races.
One day, as they arrived on the racecourse, the trainer said he had decided not to pay him any cash. Instead, leaning in and tapping the meter, he told Teddy: ‘I won’t give you a few silly coins, when you can win a fortune if you do as I tell you this afternoon.
‘Whatever you’ve made this morning, put the lot on my horse in the Derby.’ Exit Teddy’s taxi. Wheels on fire. And the rest, as they say, is history.. at 25-1.
LOOK OUT FOR A ‘RUNAWAY’ WINNER OF THE GREAT MET
1.45 Epsom Seven out of 10 winners had already raced on the Flat (turf) in their year or campaigned on AW during the winter.
Two CD winners are stablemates Diamond Charlie – has not won for getting on three years now – and Fair Value, who has raced on AW, dropping to the mark of his Epsom success in July, 2012. Diamond Charlie has Mickael Barzalona booked.
Pearl Blue will love the ground but may need the run, with Chris Wall without a winner in 2014. Peace Seeker is in form but may have to drop a few pounds, and go down in grade, to win.
Scorers on the soft include Caspian Prince, a front-runner drawn tight on the stands’ rail, making his English turf debut, and Elusivity, 18lb lower than his last success and from a stable with 20% winners this year.
VERDICT: Elusivity (5.0 on BETDAQ, as I write, despite three withdrawals), is down in the weights, loves the ground and has Jamie Spencer booked.
2.20 Epsom (Great Metropolitan Handicap) Beacon Lady won the Amateurs’ Derby here in August and Rossetti the jump-jockeys’ Derby in September.
The booking of Mickael Barzalona for Rossetti is interesting, though six-year-olds have a lean time in this against the younger horses.
Gelded over the winter, Ed Dunlop’s dual Springtime winner of 2013, Red Runaway, came straight back to score under Ryan Moore at Lingfield at the beginning of the month and he obviously wanted to keep the ride today. Mediceans get better with age.
I could not fancy Another Cocktail, Azrag, Bayan Kasirga, Aryal or Jakey in the worsening conditions this morning.
But the soft boosts the chances of Vital Evidence (fifth in the Rosebery), Dark Ruler, a winner already this season, and Da Doo Run Run, whose Manton stable sprang a suprise with J Wonder in the Fred Darling.
VERDICT: I’ll stay with Ryan Moore and Red Runaway, 2.55 on BETDAQ after four horses had come out.
Front-runner Da Doo Run Run, by a St Leger winner whose progeny do well on the soft, is better than the bare form (he was thought worth a tilt at the Queens Vase last season). Massive at 41.0.
2.50 Epsom Derby Trial Ninth and 10th. That’s the best the winner of this race has done in the Epsom Derby itself in the last decade.
It goes down instead as a ready-meal for ‘nearly horses’ trained by John Gosden (11400) and Andrew Balding (110), who’ve had the race on a plate since 2007.
Balding’s Derby entry Signposted – son of a Selkirk mare – won on heavy at Sandown in September but the Gosden pair, Marzocco and Nonno Giulio, have one run, one win each and ‘could be anything.’
Marzocco’s sire has produced Grade-1 winners in America but previous matings with Dynaformer mares have not been very productive. Nonno Giulio is a first foal, son of Halling.
Hartnell, also entered in the Derby, was third in the Group-1 Criterium De Saint-Cloud in the mud in November but had a long season for a two-year-old.
Our Chanel should improve for the trip, with trainer William Haggas currently four our of six. Trip To Paris is by a sire whose progeny do best on the soft but he needed blinkers as a two-year-old.
Moontime catches the eye on breeding, son of Sea The Stars out of Time On, a Sadlers Wells grandaughter of Time Charter. But he’s already gelded.
VERDICT: Check out the negatives: Our Chanel was also entered in a handicap this week; Moontime is a gelding; Trip To Paris needs blinkers; the Gosden pair are of doubtful pedigree.
That leaves me on Hartnell and Signposted, who has already won on the course and is from a yard which does well in this race.
3.25 Epsom (City And Suburban) Winners of this are aged four and five (9 out of 10) and usually drawn low (stalls 1 to 6 have scored seven times in nine seasons).
If not, they are able to come sweeping down the outside (two from gates 11 and 12). They should have been first or second in class 2 already (7 out of 9).
Soviet Rock won first time up last season and loves some cut in the ground because of his high knee-action. Stable in top form and he can be expected to lead.
Ebony Express likes the soft surface and has travelled south for this but he’s tried twice before to get out of class 5 and failed in class-4 races. This is two rungs higher still.
Clayton’s first run back last year was second in this race but this time around he took in a Pontefract handicap, winning well but costing his rating a 6lb rise and posing the question of whether he is capable of putting back-to-back wins together.
Stall 10 only adds to the doubt, because he likes to be with the pace and, apart from giving weight all round, may be badly positioned.
Sennockian Star, third at Pontefract that day, is well drawn and better off at the weights, though strictly not enough. Stablemate Salutation, wnner of the Rosebery at Kempton, is now on his highest mark, so being claimed off.
Tres Coronas is a stone too high but old Resurge is four times a course winner, and Weapon Of Choice is two out of three on the Downs.
Charles Camoin has also won at Epsom, has had a run back, sixth in the Newbury Spring Cup, and acts on any ground.
Hi There won first time last season and likes a deep surface but is high in the handicap, so needs to improve again. Red Avenger must have a firm surface.
VERDICT: The shape of the race seems to be decided by front-runner Soviet Rock’s favourable low draw. He could take some catching at 6.6 on BETDAQ, as I write.
Charles Camoin, at 9.4, looks badly drawn but has won here with a sweeping run down the wide outside.
THE NAP: In case I’m on another gamble, I put on record that the nap, Ut Majeur Aulmes, travelling up from Devon to Perth is around 2-1 everywhere this morning.
DAQMAN’S BETS (staked to win 20 points)
BET 5pts win ELUSIVITY (1.45 Epsom)
BET 12pts win RED RUNAWAY and 0.5pts win and place DA DO RUN RUN (2.20 Epsom)
BET 10pts win HARTNELL and 2pts win and place SIGNPOSTED (2.50 Epsom)
BET 3.5pts win SOVIET ROCK, and 2.3pts win and place CHARLES CAMOIN (3.25 Epsom)
BANKER: BET 20pts win (nap) UT MAJEUR AULMES (3.50 Perth)
UNCLE JOE’S DAQ DOUBLES: 4 x 1pt win doubles RED RUNAWAY and DA DO RUN RUN (2.20 Epsom) with SOVIET ROCK and CHARLES CAMOIN (3.25 Epsom)
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