One unplaced run is doing an enormous amount of work in the price of DIXIELAND BLUES (8:00 Wolverhampton, 10/3). Go back to Kempton on 24 September instead. He came home two lengths ahead of a rival who has since gone out and won a class 3, and that one is now rated 6lb higher than the day the pair met. Nothing about that afternoon has aged badly. He won two starts back as well, so the body of work is there, and the blank last time is the single thing standing between him and a much shorter price. His figures on the clock have been going the right way and were already good enough for this grade. Add a surface his record says he handles, stall four over a mile here, a drop in grade, and the Crisford yard putting Harry Davies up, and 10/3 in a twelve runner class 4 is more than fair for a horse carrying a mark of 87.
Windsor in the afternoon
Nine runners over a mile on good ground, and ASCENDING STAR (3:42 Windsor, 2/1) has been meeting the best of what has been running around him. At Sandown on 3 July he was beaten 1.2 lengths, and the horse who did it has since won a class 4. Another rival from his recent races has won since too, so the level he has been operating at is real rather than assumed. His own record reads 33-133, he won three starts back, he was third last time, and 32 days is a sensible gap for a horse of his profile. Stall five is the side you want at this trip on this track. Owen Burrows trains, Callum Rodriguez rides. The one honest caveat is that his raw speed figures have been modest lately and there is nothing to suggest they are about to jump, so the case rests on the company he has kept rather than the clock. At 2/1 that is still the bet.
TALLAHASSEE LASSIE (3:12 Windsor, 11/2) has good ground under her, and good ground is where her record is at its best. That is the whole of it. She won three starts back, has been unplaced twice since, and the dip is what has pushed her out to 11/2 in a class 6 sprint. James Fanshawe saddles her, Rossa Ryan takes the ride from stall nine, and she has already run over this trip and this surface.
The Wolverhampton evening
Class 6 is a drop for EVENING FADES (7:30 Wolverhampton, 6/1) and she comes into it running to the very top of what she has ever managed. Her recent numbers sit right up at her career best, which for a mare off a mark of 60 is the useful part. She was second two starts back and third last time, and William Haggas has her out again just twelve days after that placing. Horses she has been finishing alongside in those races have won since, so the placings were worth rather more than a placing usually is. Five runs without a win will put a lot of people off her, and that is precisely why she is 6/1 rather than half of it. Cieren Fallon rides, stall thirteen is a help over this trip here, and she has already handled the surface.
THE FLYING SEAGULL (8:30 Wolverhampton, 7/2) was beaten a length and a quarter at Brighton on 21 June by a horse who has since won a class 4. In a nine runner class 5 over the minimum trip, that is enough to be going on with. He steps in off 58 days, Hugo Palmer has him ready enough that he was third two starts back, Harry Davies is on for the second time on the card, and stall five over five furlongs here is the right half of the track. He has run over the trip and the surface before. There is not a great deal more to say about him, and there does not need to be.
Yesterday, from our headline picks, No More Bolero (6/4) was placed and nothing won.
The 8:00 is the race we want most tonight. Kempton on 24 September is the run that tells you what Dixieland Blues is, and the market is still pricing the one that came after it.