Tuesday’s best bets, by Chris Cook
So the going remains ‘good to firm, good in places’ in York. That’s the good news. The bad news, for those of us who’d love to see Golden Horn v Gleneagles on Wednesday, is that there is plenty of rain in York this morning, according to sundry tweets by innocent locals which are being discovered and retweeted by anxious racing folk.
Assistant clerk of the course Anthea Morshead was still calling the ground good to firm, good in places, on Tuesday morning after the rain, which started at 5am.
“We’ve had about two millimetres of rain up to 9.30am,” she said. “It’s been raining since 5am - it’s just mizzle, really. Towards the east they are getting a lot more, the likes of Beverley and Driffield, but west of us they’ve had hardly any.
“It depends which forecast you look at [as to how much more rain will fall] but the Met Office are telling us it will stay like this most of today before dying out in the evening and being a dry day tomorrow, with showers forecast for tomorrow evening. There’s no change to the ground, we’re still good to firm, good in places.”
Will there be enough rain to take the firm out of the ground and make Gleneagles a possible non-runner? Tune in later to find out …
Perhaps the only thing to really love about racing on Polytrack is that you don’t have to worry about trifling amounts of weather. And so I turn to this afternoon’s card at Kempton, where Melodica (4.45) is still interesting at a well-backed 5-4.
A three-year-old filly from Roger Charlton’s yard, she looked terribly unlucky when a running-on third at Wolverhampton recently, having been slowly away and met trouble on the way through the pack. That was her first run after more than two months off, so she should be sharper today and she has an extra two furlongs in which to get her knitting together.
She’s only 2lb higher, has scope for better and William Buick rides for the first time.
In the preceding race, you can get 8-1 about Windy Citi (4.15), whose Kempton record is three wins, a neck defeat and a third of 11 from five visits. She’s a manageable 5lb higher than for her latest success there a fortnight ago, on her return from a break, and steps down to seven furlongs for the first time since her debut, which her style of running suggests may actually help.
It’s never a bad idea to include a Silvestre de Sousa mount in your selections these days, so I’ll throw in Commanche (7.40) at Leicester tonight. They won together over this course and distance last time and Commanche is still only 1lb above his highest winning mark, so the 8-1 looks on the big side.
Tipping competition, day two
Our winners so far:
Monday
Our Boy Jack 7-2
Gowanharry 14-1
Rio Ronaldo 5-2
And our leaders are …
wimvandervom +12
JahLion +12
eddiesgottheblues +12
… who all had Gowanharry, returned at a big price for a last-time-out winner. The pursuers are led by Crasivo, 15244 and GForce1, who had both the other winners for a score of +5.
Today, we’d like your tips, please, for these races: 4.00 Ripon, 4.15 Kempton, 7.20 Chelmsford.
This week’s prize is based around the Newmarket Open Weekend taking place on the 19th and 20th of 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.
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. If you have not joined in so far this week, you are welcome to do so today, but you will start on -3.
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.
