Six days ago ARUNDEL (5:00 Wolverhampton, 6/4) won. Tonight he goes again, under Billy Loughnane in a six-runner Class 6 over a mile and a half, and the price tells you what everyone else thinks of him.
6/4 is short for a Class 6 handicap. It is short enough that you want more than one result behind it, and Arundel has more than one. At Yarmouth on 30 August he was beaten 1.8 lengths, and the horse in front of him that day has won since. So he was already running to a winning level before he won, and the win was confirmation rather than surprise. Ed Dunlop has brought him straight back while he is in this form. He has run over the trip and on this surface before, and with six runners there is not much room for the race to go wrong. He races off 65 and he is the one they all have to pass.
Loughnane stays at Wolverhampton for AFRICAN SPIRIT (8:30 Wolverhampton, 9/4) three and a half hours later, and this is a different sort of bet.
Third, third, third. Off a mark of 51 he keeps finding the frame without getting his head in front, and at 9/4 you are being asked to believe tonight is when that changes. The reason we believe it is the track. Wolverhampton is one of Ian Williams’ stronger tracks, and that matters more than usual this week because the yard has had one winner from 23 runners in the last fortnight. Stall seven is a good draw over this trip. There is also a small line from this course on 30 July, when he finished a length and a half ahead of one that has won since and is now 8lb higher in the handicap. That was only a Class 6 win, so it backs him up without carrying him.
Yesterday one of our headline picks won at 5/4 and another placed at 11/2.
Ayr on heavy ground
KEEP AN EYE ON IT (3:08 Ayr, 4/1) has the most going on of our three at Ayr. He won two starts back and was second last time, and his times have been climbing sharply. They started from a modest base, so he is not a quick horse yet. He is going the right way off 76 in a Class 4, and that is how handicappers get caught out. He has already run well round here too, finishing a length and a quarter in front of a subsequent winner on 10 August, though that one only went on to win a Class 6. He has been off 41 days, he goes from stall one of nine over ten furlongs, and David Nolan rides for Tony Coyle and Kaine Wood. We would not call him a standout. He is on the way up at a fair price.
The worry with WISE CRACK (4:08 Ayr, 11/2) is the clock, and it is a real one. His times are going the wrong way, so we are not backing a horse on the up. We are backing the company he has kept. He won four starts back, then ran fourth, fourth and fifth, and horses he finished close to in those races have gone on to win. That form has held up even if his times have not. Stall two is a favourable draw over this seven furlongs, he is back after 12 days, and Shane Gray rides for Ruth Carr in an 11-runner Class 6 off a mark of 64.
ASHEN (4:40 Ayr, 7/2) is out again eight days after his last run, over a six furlongs he has run before, with Paul Mulrennan riding for Jim Goldie. He is winless in six but has been second twice in his last four, and he is bottom weight in an eight-runner Class 4. That is the whole case and we will leave it there.
Bath, Sedgefield and Cork
Bath is good to firm for SOCIETY GIRL (2:32 Bath, 6/1), 13 runners over a mile and five furlongs. She won two starts back and was third last time. At Newmarket’s July course on 20 August one that finished a head in front of her has won since, and another from her recent races has scored as well, so the company she has been keeping is better than her bare placings. Ed Walker has given her 40 days since, and Kieran Shoemark rides from stall one off a mark of 70. Her recent times are below par, which is where you have to take her on trust. At 6/1 we will.
Only six go to post for the 6:07, and PHARITZ LAHIA (6:07 Bath, 9/2) is the unexposed one among them. She has not won yet. She was third four starts back and second three starts back, she has been off 53 days, and she starts from stall six. Silvestre De Sousa rides, and he does better at Bath than he does overall. That is thin, and at 9/2 it will do.
JOLIE COEUR ALLEN (2:15 Sedgefield, 4/1) comes down in grade from the level she last won at, and that is the start of it. She has run fourth, second and third since her break, she has gone well over course and distance before, and this is seven runners over two miles and a furlong on good ground, conditions she has met already. Then there is Market Rasen on 18 July. The one she finished three quarters of a length in front of that day has since won a Class 4, a grade above today’s race. Charlie Maggs rides for Ben Haslam off a mark of 102.
Our Irish runner takes the most explaining. CAPTAIN JAMES COOK (2:25 Cork, 7/1) is an Aidan O’Brien horse running off 63 in a seven-runner sprint on yielding to soft, and he has not won in five starts. Cork is not one of the yard’s better tracks either. What he does have is a nose. At Navan on 5 September he was beaten that far by one that has won since, though that rival’s win came off a lower mark, so the line is not worth much on its own. He is back out after eight days over a trip he has run before, with Lordan riding from stall seven. That is a short list of positives and we know it. The 7/1 is what makes it worth doing, because a horse beaten a nose three weeks ago should not be the price of one with nothing going for him.
If Arundel wins at five, Loughnane is back on African Spirit at 8:30 for the last race we are involved in.