Monday’s best bets, by Chris Cook
It’s very enjoyable to enter the last week of the jumps season with the trainer’s title race hanging in the balance, especially since one consequence is the chance to see really classy runners for Sandown’s term-ending card on Saturday. I was about to indulge in a little crow on behalf of jump racing about how Flat racing would love to produce this kind of climax but surely will not be able to, with the new trainers’ title that follows the calendar year.
Then it occured to me that the jump jockeys’ championship hasn’t produced memorable last-week tension for decades. The Flat racing equivalent, on the other hand, has had at least three good, late tussles in the past decade or so and could fairly claim to be a lot more competitive. So neither of racing’s two great tribes can claim they have an unbeatable formula for late-season drama.
Soft ground continues to prevail for this week’s Flat racing but I think Terhaal (2.40) should cope well with conditions at Pontefract. This lightly raced four-year-old didn’t turn out until September last year and needed that first outing but showed a good level of form in two soft-ground handicaps the next month, meeting traffic problems when stepped up to a mile at Newmarket last time.
I can easily imagine David O’Meara having got some improvement out of him since we last saw him, the horse having only been at that yard for a year, so he appeals at 9-2 for this 10-runner contest.
Pick of the Windsor card could be Kinglami (6.20), whose form at this track is 7312121. You could reduce that to 12121 if you looked only at six-furlong handicaps, like the one in which he is a 20-1 shot today.
Of course, he achieved those wins for Brian Gubby and perhaps John O’Shea, who has him this year, hasn’t yet got the key to him or perhaps Kinglami is just getting on a bit. The lack of market interest is a bit disconcerting. But soft ground should be no problem and he’s only 3lb above his last winning mark, from last May, so I’m interested.
Tipping competition - a new week
Congratulations to Geoff Staddon, who won last week’s competition by a single point on a final score of +27.25, adding Demora (9-1) on Friday to other winners he’d had during the week, including 16-1 and 11-1. TheVic had Demora AND Defnitly Red on Friday to finish on +26.25.
This week’s prize is a copy of Timeform’s ‘Horses To Follow’ for the new Flat season, featuring 50 animals picked by Timeform’s team of experts, with plenty more to read in the features section at the back, including Irish horses to follow and ante-post tips. If you don’t win, you can buy a copy here.
To kick things off, we’d like your selections, please, for these races: 3.10 Pontefract, 3.50 Newton Abbot, 6.20 Windsor.
As ever, our champion will be the tipster who returns the best profit to notional level stakes of £1 at starting price on our nominated races, of which there will be three each day up until Friday. Non-runners count as losers.
In the event of a tie at the end of the week, the winner will be the tipster who, from among those tied on the highest score, posted their tips earliest on the final day.
For terms and conditions click here.
Good luck!
And post your tips or racing-related comments below.
