AFTER Longchamp’s Arc weekend the top-class racing continues this week, with Group One contests on both Friday and Saturday’s cards at Newmarket.
Saturday’s Dewhurst traditionally provides key Classic clues for next season and, at the moment, Ballydoyle and Godolphin hold seven of the eight entries.
With Aidan O’Brien accounting for five, and most of those horses holding multiple entries, it’s hard to know who he will go to war with, so while The Lion In Winter looks the most obvious candidate, it’s not a race to be betting on at this stage.
The following contest, the Cesarewitch (3.40pm), however, is one of the major betting races of the season.
There is usually a full 34-runner field for this 2m2f marathon over the Rowley Mile, but surprisingly there have been only 28 entries this year, so it looks like a renewal that may lack a bit of depth.
In my eyes the two horses at the top of the betting – Sea Of Sands and Jacovec Cavern – are there based on their trainers’ reputations rather than what they’ve achieved on the track.
Willie Mullins has won three of the last 10 renewals of this race, so it’s understandable that bookies are treating his Sea Of Sands with the utmost caution.
He was a Group Three winner in Germany in 2021, so has some back class, but he wasn’t seen for a mammoth 776 days before making a winning debut for Mullins at Listowel last month.
While his handicap mark may underestimate him, this race is a completely different kettle of fish to that of Listowel, and at his price of around 4/1 he makes little appeal.
Mullins’ nephew Emmet won this race last year with The Shunter and brings Jacovec Cavern here after a good second to Busselton in a Galway handicap hurdle.
This horse had some moderate form on the Flat when trained by Mick Channon but his new handler needs to have improved him a great deal if he is to land this.
I’d rather side with a horse that has both proven ability and stamina in Joseph O’Brien’s DAWN RISING, and he is available to back at much more attractive odds of 16/1.
The seven-year-old gelding was presented with some stiff tasks in the early season, twice running up behind Kyprios.
Since then, he has shown improved form when finishing third in the 2m5f Queen Alexandra Stakes – a contest he won in 2023 – and most recently when fifth in the Irish Cesarewitch, proving his stamina for this assignment.
That last run was a good effort as he kept on strongly into fifth at the finish and more can be expected from him now with that race his first after a near 100-day break, so he rates a strong each way bet.
NDAAWI isn’t sure to line up, but if he does then he looks to have a good chance for Gordon Elliott.
Most recently seen finishing with a late rattle to claim second in the Galway Hurdle, he also has decent form on the Flat after placing seventh in the 2m4f Ascot Stakes in June.
He might have finished a bit closer then too had he not been squeezed up against the rail at a crucial stage in the home straight.
He’s still unexposed as a stayer on the Flat and looks attractively weighted off a mark of 92, a pound lower than at Ascot, so he’s another each-way fancy at around 14/1.
SELECTIONS SATURDAY
Dawn Rising e/w 3.40pm Newmarket
Ndaawi e/w 3.40pm Newmarket
