Friday’s Racing Tips – Step up in trip looks key for the progressive Lake Forrest

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Thursday was a poor day with neither of the selections looking up to the job.

I only managed to catch my last selection Profiteer, who I thought ran well for a long way, however, his effort dwindled out within the final furlong and on that evidence looks firmly in the hands of the handicapper. Tomorrow is a new day, and hopefully a turn of luck is only around the corner.

Cairnzy's Tips

Lake Forrest 9/4 – Newbury 4.05

This Class 1 Listed event features a highly competitive field, with the winner earning a nice prize of just under £30,000. Several familiar names that have been tipped in this thread before, such as English Oak, Nostrum, and Witch Hunter, are among the entrants. Rather than going with a previous selection, I've decided to back Lake Forrest from the in-form William Haggas yard for this race.

My selection enjoyed a productive campaign as a juvenile, with the pick of his form coming at York when landing the valuable Group 2 Gimcrack Stakes where he beat home some really nice types such as Haatem, King's Gamble and Johannes Brahms. Lake Forrest has only raced the two times this seaon as a three year old but despite not winning on either of those outings, I still feel he has taken his form to a new level with runner up efforts in the Group 1 Commonwealth Cup and the Group 2 Hackwood Stakes.

Lake Forrest has been hitting the line strongly this term, suggesting that this step up in trip is well within reach for William Haggas's youngster and there's no better jockey to have in the saddle than Tom Marquand when you need a strong finishing effort. The remainder don't spark me with much confidence, in particular Nostrum who tends to fire more cold than hot despite his attractive pedigree. English Oak has failed to step up this term after looking like a possible Group horse at the beginning of the season while Witch Hunter tends to runs a good race without getting the head in front.

Rizzel's Tips

Frost At Dawn 5/1 – Ayr 3.40

Fillies Race at Listed level can often be very poor on paper, and I think that is the case for this race with only a few horses actually able to win this based on the form they have shown. That made me think about tipping up Azure Blue again as I think she would easily romp home in this if she was back to her best, but last time out she was horrendous and I did mention that it wouldn't surprise me if that was the last time we saw her on the track. Knowing my luck, now I'm going against her, she'll end up coming back to haunt me, which she is more than capable of doing in this poor race. Instead of tipping her, I've gone for Frost At Dawn.

With my selection it will need a bit of trust as she has only been seen once so far this year which came in the Nunthorpe last month, where she finished 10th/12. Based on her brief Meydan campaign earlier in the year she was more than entitled to have gone for that race, but with how the track was riding and with the big layoff it was always going to be a tough ask. I don't think she raced that bad, she was convincingly beaten, but so were many other classy sprinters who would romp home in this race, so I think it was a nice pipe opener.

Today's race is a much easier assignment that the Group 1 at York. There are so many low rated horses in this race who would need all of the top rated horses to under perform to be competitive. For me, the best piece of recent form from this year was from Frost At Dawn from her 5f success at Meydan when beating the Godolphin horse, Star Of Mystery by 2.5L in a Group 3. The runner-up then went on to finish second in a Group 1 at the same track and has since won a Group 3 in America. That was Frost At Dawn's first attempt over 5f and she clearly relished it, proving she has the pace for the trip, as they went quicker than standard. A repeat perfomance would see her win this race with ease and it's a long way to travel for William Knight's horse, so a big run has to be on the cards.

Caballo De Mar 4/1 – Ayr 5.20

I thought it was interesting that Callum Shepherd has decided to come up to Ayr, mainly for the ride on Caballo De Mar as he is the stable jockey for George Scott, rather than two rides at Kempton for the same trainer (George has three at Kempton but two are in the same race). Obviously, Callum has picked up a couple of spare rides at Ayr today, but he would have gone up to Ayr mainly for his boss George Scott, which gives me further confidence that Caballo De Mar will run a big race for a rare runner at the track from this yard.

This will be George Scott's fifth ever runner at the track, and the third in the last five years, so it shows that he doesn't like sending horses this far unless thinking they've got a chance. He has had one winner and a second from those four runners, which is a decent representation of what I have just said from the small sample size we've got to our disposal. This horse appears to have a lovely chance of winning now he is getting a slightly longer trip than what he has been running over in recent times. It's only an extra furlong, which is 200 yards, but small margins like that can often be enough to see a horse progress and I think it's definitely a step in the right direction as he has stayed on well over the furlong shorter, and the form looks fairly solid.

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