14-1 HIT AMONG THREE WINNERS: The good things and the outsiders. Daqman tries to trap them all, just missing a yankee by half a length– four bets, three winners – across the cards at three meetings yesterday for 66 points profit to recommended stakes. In race order:
WON 1-3 David’s Duchess (banker)
2nd 7-4 Bahamian Sunrise (half length)
WON 13-8 Medburn Cutler
WON 14-1 Bernisdale
ABC GUIDE TO THE ECLIPSE: Daqman assesses the Eclipse Stakes at Sandown on Saturday with a bias to older horses in the stats and slow ground likely. It’s his famous ABC guide.
ECLIPSE DREAM HANGS ON SOFT GROUND
3.45 Sandown, Saturday (Coral-Eclipse) Emerging from six handicap starts in 2015, My Dream Boat has been a punter’s favourite as he’s climbed the ranks, winning four, all on soft, yet a better and better price (3-1, 8-1, 17-2, 16-1) for the Clive Cox yard, normally associated with sprinters and handicappers.
A Horses aged four and five (8/10)
B Group-1 winner (9/10)
C Winner at 1m 2f plus (9/10)
D Rated 119 to 126 (9/10)
X Trainer in peak form
S Has won on soft ground
ABCDS My Dream Boat
Has shot up 21lb in four wins from five races since last backend, from Listed to Group 3, ever upwards until the defeat of Found and Western Hymn in a thrilling finish to the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes at Royal Ascot.
That was over Saturday’s distance in Saturday’s likely ground, and it makes him the only older horse with Group-1 winning form.
ACDX Exosphere
Weak and backward but persevered with by that great horse whisperer of racing, Sir Michael Stoute, and his patience paid off when he won the Group-2 Jockey Club Stakes in the Spring, trouncing Simple Verse, the British Champion Mare of last October, by four lengths.
The ground was said to be too soft for him when flopping behind stablemate Dartmouth in the Hardwicke Stakes.
ACD Time Test
Said to want ‘really quick ground’, he needs time for fairer weather to alleviate the testing surface. That’s possible with drying days from tomorrow but the track is soft this morning and the Saturday forecast is for going ‘on the slow side.’
Five-time winner in six starts in the last 14 months, including at Royal Ascot 2015, following up in a Group 2 at Newmarket in September. Started this season by beating Western Hymn in the Group-2 Brigadier Gerard Stakes over the Eclipse CD
ACS Western Hymn
Perhaps the top ‘nearly horse’ in training, second to Time Test, second and third to My Dream Boat; third in this last year to Golden Horn. In fact, he has finished in the first four in 14 out of 15 starts, and could do so again without winning.
AX Cougar Mountain
The entire won a one-mile Group 3 on firm at Leopardstown last August after a well-beaten fourth behind Golden Horn in this Eclipse.
A Countermeasure
Maiden who had to be dropped to a handicap before reaching the frame and officially 41lb off the top rating here. Likely pacemaker for Time Test.
BDXS The Gurkha
The Classic generation’s front-man. Travels well and will love the cut in the ground. First try beyond a mile but dam related to an Arc winner.
Stormed clear in the French 2,000 Guineas, though the form of that race now reads Group 2 at best, despite the Racing Post’s form claiming that it ‘has worked out well.’
Split Guineas winner Galileo Gold and Awtaad at Royal Ascot, beaten odds-on favourite after lying too far out of his ground, though jockey Ryan Moore had no reason to fear the trip or the soft surface.
CXS Hawkbill
Unbeaten in five starts, culminating in the Tercentenary Stakes over the 1m 2f at Royal Ascot, but that was Group 3 and his first run in the Pattern. Needs to climb two more rungs of the ladder.
XS Deauville
Deemed another ‘nearly horse’ – not won for almost a year – after runner-up in the Dante and down the field in the Derby. It’s a rare year when the Dante has not worked out well, the winner a well-beaten fourth at Epsom.
X Bravery
A stone at least behind the best in this race, more than eight lengths off Awtaad in the Irish Guineas and runner-up to a 97 horse in an ordinary conditions race on the last day.
X Long Island Sound
Spring hat-trick, two of them on Polytrack before stopped in a Group 3 by Hawkbill at Royal Ascot. Tongue-tied in all four starts, suggesting that better ground would suit.
HERE’S A JUMBO BATCH OF FAST JUVENILES
2.00 Catterick Potentially a much better race than might appear at first glance, with well-bred sprinting types, some already raced so ready to fly.
Rusumaat is out of the unbeaten two-year-old Arcano, winner of the Prix Morny in a good year. He may well win but is a short price this morning, with better offers the place about others that catch the eye.
I Call The Shots (sire second in the Guineas and dam related to top sprinters) has been gelded since running behind Rusumaat at Redcar.
The grey Major Jumbo is a son of Zebedee who has got some fast two-year-olds (see also Zebedee Star) and the dam is related to Australian.
Babouska’s sire has a very good record with juveniles. Notalot’s trainer, Michael Bell has a 75% strike rate (3-4) with his two-year-olds on this course.
Suitcase N’Taxi is first foal of a dam from a line of sprinters; sire ran second in the Coventry, as did the sire of Peach Pavlova, who was strong in the BETDAQ market this morning. Whigwham is from sprinting stock.
With rain forecast on a track already on the soft side of good, I couldn’t take the near-even-money Rusumaat in such a potentially strong race.
I’ll go for a couple of punts (17.0 Major Jumbo) and Notalot (30.0), though you never know what is intended only to tot up the maiden sbefore going handicapping in nurseries.
And the real money should come from taking out the winner of the race and following his or her career.
FANCY THAT! DAY LOOKS BEST FOR TONIGHT
7.10 Kempton Mark Johnston is 5-6 with his two-year-olds here and Fancy Day is reckoned a bit special. Certainly nothing near her in the BETDAQ morning market on a hard course for newcomers to attack a front-runner.
7.30 Bath Sir Mark Prescott is leading trainer at Bath, percentage wise (38%) and he hopes St Michel, showing improvement all the time, is a sequence horse.
The yard has fewer ‘streakers’ these days and rain dampens confidence in a tricky contest. Prescott says he ‘hasn’t a clue’ whether St Michel would act on soft.
Rainbow Dreamer may be flattered by his proximity to Irish Derby fourth Red Verdon at Haydock, and has to give 11lb to Blakeney Point, who beat St Michel earlier in the season.
Blakeney Point is a Sir Percy, who has a terrific record with his progeny on soft-heavy ground, and the 6.2 offers on BETDAQ looked interesting this morning. You can always save on St Miichel if the rain stays away.
9.00 Bath Soft-ground horse Vincentti is the wrong price at 9.6 as an alternative to the renewed match between Posh Bounty and Fantasy Justifier, only ounces between them now.
DAQMAN’S BETS (on a poor day’s racing; stakes 1 to 9 for strength)
BET 1pt win and place on each MAJOR JUMBO and NOTALOT (2.00 Catterick)
BET 8pts win (nap) FANCY DAY (7.10 Kempton)
BET 5pts win BLAKENEY POINT and 2.5pts (stakes saver) ST MICHEL (7.30 Bath)
BET 6pts win PECKING ORDER (8.40 Kempton)
BET 3pts win VINCENTTI (9.00 Bath)
£25 IN FREE BETS
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