Free Ratings 30 July 2018

10.45 – updated with bet of the day, rugs challenge, and lay of the day.

After the excitement and drama of the Formpro Amazing Chase, it’s back to the future with 15 races at Palmerston North split across the two meeting codes.

It’s also the last meeting of the season in the North Island and with it the last chance for the Coles to break the record for the number of wins in a season.

So still lots of action left in the season!  And hopefully we can find a winner or two after a couple of off weeks.

First race is 12.15 pm.

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Bet of the Day – M3 R2 Flying Lachie (1)

We are going to go early and put our faith in the trusty red rug to get us back in the winner’s circle.  To be fair, last week’s selection may have bombed on Monday but it won like a champion on Friday night.

Flying Lachie looks a good bet from box 1.  The improved box draw should make the difference and three back he won over the same distance in the same rug.

He’s not likely to be the first out of the boxes but Bigtime Hannah in box 2 looks the likely leader.  However she runs straight and if anything could veer a little out to the right so it should create a nice space for Lachie to get to the rails.  From there he should be good enough to hold on.

Bigtime Hannah has to be in the mix as does the emergency Choice Lass.  The two dogs in the outside boxes – Blue Precision and Fantastic Teddy – look the others likely to feature in the exotics.

At $2.90, Flying Lachlie looks a good bet.

Lachie was a tad disappointing – never really in the picture although he did run on for fourth.  We did find the tri and the first 4 but still not the outcome we had hoped for.  The only consolation is our backup rug (8) is two from two and I suspect you won’t be getting $12 on the pink after race 2.

Rugs Challenge – M3 White Rug (3)

We almost got up with the rugs challenge last week.  As we noted, the odds can swing dramatically over the course of the races in the challenge and our rug got out to over 20s at one stage before storming home and being equal top going into the last.

I like the white rug (3) today.  The Predictor has the white rug on top in 4 races and mapped to lead three of those.  Bigtime Paddy is also in the white so that looks a reasonable anchor.

We may be giving the others a bit of a start with the first two races not playing our way.  That should mean we will get better than the current $4.80.  The other rug that looks overs at $12 is the pink rug.

Not a bet type I would go mad on but if you want an interest across all 10 races, it’s a cheap way out.

Well well well, perhaps it is a bet type I should go mad on after all!  It was pretty much a two dog race but after opening at $12s, the pink rug was paying $1.01 before race 7.  Nice to get some back!  It shows the value of the Predictor – the Predictor ignores the $$$ – some times it’s right, some times it’s wrong but today the Predictor showed that the pink rug was right in the mix.  

Lay of the Day – M3 R9 Hypocritical (5)

I think this is a very open race – Hypocritical definitely is in the mix but you could potentially make a case for most runners.  The Predictor has a very narrow spread over the field which highlights how open it is.

Hypocritical is favourite based on his class and his last start win.  His win on Friday was in C4 and he gets another crack at C4 today.  However, I think there are three flags worth noting:

• He’s drawn box 5 and will need some luck from the boxes
• He maps to be second to last out – so again will need luck
• His recent performances have been a little down on his best – his best rating the last 6 starts was his win on Friday night but his best last 6 rating is close to the worst in the field

On that basis, I couldn’t have him at $2.60FF.

It’s a hard way to earn $2.60FF but a win is a win.  Got all favours and just won but you would expect he will need to do better back up in C5.  

Back again next week – 1 out of 3 isn’t a great return but the $12 on the pick rug certainly helped.