Monday’s best bets, by Chris Cook
As has been widely reported, William Haggas has spent the last few days gathering up every sound horse in the yard and loading them into boxes bound for Yorkshire, where he would be delighted to have a good week at the Ebor meeting. Alpine Dream evidently has not quite made the cut for that mission but she’s gone north anyway, to Thirsk, where she is currently favourite for her racecourse debut in the opener.
She has talented parents but so far her siblings have been pretty slow and, for what it’s worth, I note that Haggas is 0/16 with his juveniles this month. The claims of Winter Hey Lane (2.10) seem quite a bit stronger, considering she is a better price at 11-4, and I shall give Richard Fahey’s filly a whirl on a quiet day’s action.
Her purchase price increased nicely from last year to this and she has a winning sibling in America. Fahey went through a slow patch with his juveniles in June but his record for August is a deeply impressive 11/43.
The money is already coming for Dancing Star (5.35) in the opener at Windsor tonight, Andrew Balding’s filly being 11-4 from 5-1. She was a decent fourth on her debut here in June in a race that has worked out really well, with the first, second, third, fifth and seventh all winning since. The winner was Belvoir Bay, who looked so classy in a nursery at the Glorious meeting.
Dancing Star will be helped by the extra furlong today and runners from her yard can make a lot of progress from first run to second.
Tipping competition – a new week
Congratulations to jakebuckfast, who won last week’s competition on a final score of +26.50, having picked Whatdoiwantthatfor (11-4) on Friday. Waltersobchak (+15.50) was second and Bonzodrongo (+14.75) third. Jake, I understand you can’t use the tickets but do look out for an email from us and reply if you can.
This week’s prize is based around the Newmarket Open Weekend taking place on 19 and 20 September. You can read more about it here. We’re offering two pairs of tickets to the Open Weekend, allowing admission to all Newmarket Open Weekend attractions and sites and including Premier enclosure tickets to the racing on the Saturday at the Rowley Mile. A large number of Newmarket trainers will welcome the public to their yards for the Sunday of the Open Weekend and there will be plenty of other attractions including a Food and Drinks festival.
To kick things off, we’d like your selections, please, for these races: 4.10 Thirsk, 5.10 Thirsk, 7.35 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!
Click here for all the day’s racecards, form, stats and results.
And post your tips or racing-related comments below.
