Friday’s Nap wasn’t quite as fruitful as Thursday’s, with Old Gregorian finishing last of those to complete the race at Aintree. It’s a funny old game. Moving on to Saturday, and it’s Grand National day.
| Wolverhampton - 17:45 |
Standput |
18/1 (each way) |
For anyone interested, Hyland is the each-way dart that I'll be throwing at the rather tiny Grand National board, but that’s not what I’m here to talk about. Today’s Nap runs at Wolverhampton, where ahead of the third race on the card, a seven-furlong Class 5 handicap, Standput looks generously priced in the early betting. Here’s why:
For starters, the lightly-raced three-year-old comes into this contest having won a shade cosily on her only previous visit to this venue, getting the job done in a handicap not dissimilar to this over C&D back in late January. From just 2 lbs higher in the weights, I think she could easily go closer than early odds of 20/1 would have us believe.
Has some interesting form with a couple of those closer to the front of the market
Sure, the filly disappointed at Kempton last time out, but I’m happy to overlook that on the strength of her course-and-distance effort, while the form of her close-up fourth over this trip at Southwell in February doesn’t look bad at all in relation to this contest.
On her penultimate start at Southwell, she ran respectably to finish fourth, beaten just a length by a winner that has gone on to perform well in a better race than this. Interestingly, she also finished three parts of a length behind a horse that recently beat both Packetofbiscuits and Blue Empress by a decent margin over this track and trip, which tells me that the Richard Hannon runner should probably be much closer to that pair in the market.
There really was nothing wrong with that Southwell effort and if she can repeat that now returning to the scene of her last crime, from 1 lb lower in the weights, for a Hannon yard that has fired in a few winners of late, then she’d likely have little trouble outrunning overly big odds.
It’s also worth noting that the claim of Joe Leavy has been used to good effect of late, and the 3 lbs that he takes off leaves this girl looking nicely weighted. 20/1 represents lots of each-way value as far as I’m concerned.
Based on a £10 level-stakes example, the Nap of the Day (after 110 Naps) has a running P/L of -£49.00 (since switching to being published here (10/09/2024) rather than on the ‘Nap of the Day' page).
For those interested, here’s a monthly profit and loss breakdown (again based on a £10 level-stakes example):
September 2024 = +£34.00
October 2024 = +£6.00
November 2024 = +£15.00
December 2024 = +£50.00
2024 Overall = +105.00
January 2025 = -£120.00
February 2025 = +£20.00
March 2025 = -£79.00
GambleAware