Ian Ogg's Best Bets
Ian Ogg picks out his best bets from the seven cards on a busy Bank Holiday Monday, including the totepool Zetland Gold Cup.
By Ian Ogg
Last Updated: 29/05/11 5:16pm
The totepool Zetland Gold Cup at Redcar is the big betting race of the day and the ten furlong contest has been farmed by southern based trainers in recent years and Sarrsar can maintain their dominance.
He progressed well at the backend of last season for Michael Jarvis and the four year old, who is now trained by Saeed Bin Suroor, is open to plenty of improvement after just seven career starts and should be all the better for his reappearance at Ripon over a mile.
The form of that race is rock solid with the placed horses all running well on their next starts whilst the Newmarket handler has an excellent record both at Redcar and with his handicappers.
A high draw will not make life easy for Take It To The Max in the Lloyd Honda Carlisle Bell Trial at the Cumbrian venue but his prominent running style should negate that to some degree.
Formerly with George Moore, the four year old was a smart juvenile whose two year old campaign culminated with a defeat of Anhar in a conditions race at Newmarket when rated 97.
It was perhaps not surprising that he struggled last term as a result of that lofty mark but the assessor showed him plenty of clemency and he reappeared earlier in the month for his new connections on a mark of just 72.
A 5lb rise for that smooth Hamilton success still leaves him very well treated on his old form. This stiff mile will hold no fears for the ten furlong winner who won't be inconvenienced if the rain arrives.
At Goodwood the feature race of the day is the Listed West Sussex County Times On House Stakes where Rainfall is a clear pick on official figures and should, in theory, take all the beating.
She may well be able to see out the mile trip better with another year on her back but this promises to be run at a decent clip with The Rectifier and Set The Trend in the field and that could expose any ring-rustiness on her first run of the campaign ahead of Royal Ascot.
She can be taken on with triple course winner Tropical Paradise who looked in need of the run when finishing a fair fourth in a Lingfield in a Group Three from a bad draw.
She has yet to win over a mile and may ideally prefer a little more ease in the ground but there is some rain forecast and she ran well enough over a stiff mile at Pontefract last season to believe that it won't be a problem
The run at Lingfield should ensure that the dual Group Three winner is cherry ripe for this race which is an obvious early season target for the Peter Winkworth trained mare.
Recommendations
3.10 Goodwood - Tropical Paradise 2pts win
4.10 Redcar - Sarrsar 1pt win
4.05 Carlisle - Take It To The Max 1pt win