DAQMAN on FRIDAY

Friday 6 March 500 DAYS OF DAQMAN: Daqman is 500 days old today and he celebrates with two massively daring lays, both of them the obvious winners and both short-priced favourites. He’s got a lays profit of 1,148 points to play with. DOUBLE WHAMMY: He yesterday laid Et Maintenant (2nd 5-2) and backed the winner, Banoge (won 2-1), in the same race at Carlisle. TARGET 200: He now needs eight more successful lays to reach 200, as he clings on by a decimal point to his 75% strike rate. NAP WINS: Daqman also landed his nap yesterday, Akhenaten (won 11-10), and had five winning bets in all, bringing his total to 73 in the last 32 days. Come Out Firing! This one should hit the target blindfold and facing the other way. That’s how it looks on the official ratings when the horse of that name races 13lb ahead of the handicapper at Leicester today. Did I say 13? The Racing Post ratings have Come Out Firing showing ‘an improved rating since the weights were published’ of 41. Steady on, lads! Before you think this is the certainty you’ve been waiting for, let me warn you that, as the saying goes, when the proverbial No 6 bus finally arrives, there are three of them. Marchand d’Argent (2.10 Sandown) is 16lb ahead of the game (26 in the Racing Post ratings) and Ballyvaden (4.50 Leicester) has 10lb to play with (11 by Post assessment). If, in fact, you have faith in Capt H.A.R. Wallace (7), Marchand d’Argent also has his allowance – what, another 7lb! - in hand. The one I’d fear most is last year’s winner, Bonchester Bridge, at an attractive 10.5 for a nice each-way bet on Betdaq, as I write, so I’ll just slip the favourite in my Daq Multiples and hope to get two returns from the same race, one of them boosted in doubles and trebles. Black Hills (2.45) is another each-way bet on the Sandown card (a superb 14.5 on the Daq this morning); he’s spent his life in much better company, including races at both Aintree and Punchestown festivals last April, and is very well handicapped here. Meanwhile, back to the racing ‘certainty,’ Come Out Firing (3.05 Leicester): he gets his lofty revised ratings from a Hereford race in which he fell. I should add that he was 20 lengths clear at the time. So you risk because he’s amateur ridden and you risk because of that fall and because he’s never won under Rules. However, five of his opponents are aged 11 and more, and like me – I’m also over 11 – have lost a bit of their zip; three others are saddled by trainers Foster, Rowe and Wilson who have failed to win a race in a total of 2,050 days of trying; and three of the remaining field are maidens. That leaves just Mickwell Bay, who could finish only third in the Hereford race in which Come Out Firing so unluckily fell. At odds against this morning (2.47 on Betdaq), he was fired straight into my Daq Multiples. The other stand-out, Ballyvaden (4.50), sauntered home over course and distance in today’s conditions 10 days ago and he, too, is odds against this morning. Away from the hunters and amateurs of Sandown and Leicester, Ayr has the second of my three weekend lays - I got the first one up yesterday - Sammy Spiderman (4.05), raised in class, raised in rating, raised in trip; yet favourite. Sammy is only six and could improve enough; and he has the advantage of a low weight mark in the heavy ground. Maybe he’s only scraped home the last twice because he needs this extra trip. But that’s a risk factor and his price is too short to be building in risk factors. I have two running for me - three if Commercial Flyer does a Teeming Rain and belies his Scrabble form figures -  and both are proven at 3m. Panama At Once has won over the trip and was the ‘moral’ when failing by only half a length to give 18lb to Almire Du Lia after a bad mistake at the last. Silver By Nature made all over half a mile shorter on the course last month and might have done the same over 25 furlongs in January but fell when leading at the last. Three horses with something to prove, one of them sure to set a fair pace, makes this a cracking race for a sporting lay. It’s 20.0 bar two in the stayers’ novice hurdle at Wincanton with Paul Nicholls’ Gossmore Yank odds-on fodder for my multiples and Rodney’s Pillar (3.45) a good each way bet at 6.8. On the form of two different races at Folkestone, Amir El Jabal (4.55) is a 15 lengths better horse than Narlen who, in turn, is 23lb inferior to Wasntme, yet Wasntme is getting 21lb from ‘Amir’ today. It may not work out like that but, at the offers available – ‘Amir’ is favourite – I know which one I’m backing and which one is my second sporting lay of the day. At Wolverhampton tonight, where the racing is the most competitive of the day, and there are three Betdaq-sponsored races, I am betting in the 8.20. Orpenindeed is dropped in class and back to the trip, and with the same claiming rider, that saw him divide Resplendent Nova and Aeroplane at Kempton. Plum draw, too.
TODAY'S BETS
BET 2pts win and 2pts place BONCHESTER BRIDGE (2.10 Sandown) BET 2pts win and 2pts place BLACK HILLS (2.45 Sandown) BET 2pts win and 2pts place RODNEY’S PILLAR (3.45 Wincanton) LAY to win 10pts SAMMY SPIDERMAN (4.05 Ayr) LAY to win 10pts AMIR EL JABAL and 4pts win WASNTME (4.55 Wincanton) BET 6pts win (nap) ORPENINDEED (8.20 Wolverhampton) DAQ MULTIPLES: 6 x 1pt win doubles Marchand dArgent (2.10 Sandown), Come Out Firing (3.05 Leicester), The Gossmore Yank (3.45 Wincanton), Ballyvaden (4.50 Leicester).
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