Back To Bread And Butter...

After the fun in the sun of the Epsom Derby meeting, its now back to the bread and butter stuff until Royal Ascot (starts Tuesday 19th June).

For all that it is pretty uninspiring fare, there are still winners to be wagered and losers to be layed.

Lingfield host one of their few turf meetings today and, traditionally on faster ground, there is a slight bias towards high numbers on the sprint track.

So, I'll take a look at the 3.45, an 18 runner handicap over the straight six furlongs, for my horse to back.

The obvious start point is Vegas Boys, who is in great form, and beat all bar the progressive Osiris Way last time. He should run a solid race, but is high enough in the weights (conceding all round here) and might not be too well boxed.

Joy And Pain has a lot going for him. He has won in big fields (including at this meeting last year on similar ground over 7 furlongs), and from trap 11 is not too far from the supposedly favoured high stalls. Dane O'Neill is a good man to have up top, so this one should be tough to beat. At 8/1 on betfair, he's tempting.

But I'm going to take a punt (literally) on something at bigger odds. The nag that catches my eye is drawn hard against the rail in 18, so if the advantage is high, he has the best of it. Smile For Us likes to blaze a trail, so should be able to optimize his berth, and is relatively unexposed on turf, having done most of his running on the beach.

In only two runs on good to firm over six furlongs, Smile For Us has won (by five lengths!) and finished a close up 4th of 15 (beaten 1 3/4 lengths, only headed inside the final furlong). He is on the same handicap mark today as he was when he won so convincingly and, at 17/1 on betfair currently (over 3/1 for the place as well), he looks as good an option as any.

Trying to find one to beat today is quite tricky, for no better reason than I don't like to lay horses at greater than 5/2. (The potential payout proffers disproportionate palpitations - try saying that when you've had a couple of scoops!).

So, the one I want to field against runs tonight at Southwell in the 'lucky last'.
The horse in question is Newtonian, currently trading around 5/2 on the exchange.

With a win strike rate of two from seventeen, both wins coming over the slightly longer 1m4f trip here. He seems to relish a decent gallop, something which is far from guaranteed in this small field.

At eight years old, he's hardly a progressive type and, in what could be a muddling affair, I reckon he'll be well tapped for toe as they turn in.

Incidentally, when looking for horses who could beat Newtonian, I was interested in Mahmjra (around 9/2, two wins, two thirds from four starts over course and distance), and Musical Giant (21/1 and drifting, first start on AW, having cost 300,000 Guineas!!! He is by Giant's Causeway, who is a son of the mightiest of all dirt sites, Storm Cat. Could be a massive improver for the change of surface. Or could run like an expensive dog...)

So there it is, today's choices. These are not based on any system you might see elsewhere on the pages of Nag3, aside from my own reading of the races.