The Championships Day 1: Doncaster Mile Preview & Tips
It looks like being a wet and wild start to The Championships at Royal Randwick on Saturday with torrential rain over the last few days set to produce a likely Soft or Heavy track on Saturday. That will certainly throw the cat among the pigeons on Saturday with wet weather form proving important. It’s likely that we’ll see a few upsets which will make betting tricky.
There are a number of great races, but we’re going to preview one of the feature races of the day in the Doncaster Mile (Race 9, 5:10pm).
It’s an outstanding line up for this race with a big field of 20 runners expected to fill the barriers to battle it out over the 1600 metres.
Hallowed Crown ($6.00 at CrownBet) is the favourite and rightly so. An impressive three-year old colt with six wins from eight starts, including two Group 1s, if only he’d drawn a good barrier, the punters would be all over him. However a tricky outside barrier has him likely to sit three-wide which will make it tough to overcome a field of this quality. He’ll need some luck in running, or hope that the outside provides better ground come Race 9 on the card.
Japanese horse Real Impact ($10 at Sportsbet) was superb in the Group 1 George Ryder Stakes a fortnight ago leading from the front, and he’ll be looking to do that again in the Doncaster. Being out in front of a big field is not a bad place to be and he’ll have lengths on some of those coming from the back, but the heavy ground is a big question mark. It’s a similar question mark for the other Japanese horse in the race in World Ace ($26 at Sportsbet).
There may be support for Happy Trails ($21 at Ladbrokes) as a fan favourite and he does look well set in his preparation but a horrible heavy track record makes it a tough ask.
Looking at those with better wet weather form and it’s hard to look past Royal Descent ($10 at Bet365). An ultra-consistent horse, while at the same time ultra-performing with a string of nearby misses in Group 1 races. It’s been two years since she won a race, so it’s hard to put your money on a non-winning horse, but Royal Decent ticks all the boxes here. Her two runs this preparation have been good, so she’s building for this race and the wet weather is a huge positive. She finished second in this race last year, and looked the winner until run down by Sacred Falls.
Can Sacred Falls ($17 at Sportbet) make it three in a row in this race? He’s certainly a strong chance with the wet weather suiting. He’s third-up here and while the first two runs were disappointing, he likes the big stage and will be flying home late.
Another swimmer in with a great chance is Arabian Gold ($15 at Unibet). A perfect three from three on heavy, a good barrier draw and well-weighted, the price on Arabian Gold has been smashed, so while the value is gone, she appears a great chance.
Verdict: Wet weather and a huge field means this is a tough race to pick. We’ll assume a heavy track and look to those with form in the wet to come through with the goods. Hallowed Crown ($6.00 at CrownBet) needs to get across but looks the horse to beat. Royal Decent and Arabian Gold huge chances at value.
1st Hallowed Crown
2nd Royal Descent
3rd Arabian Gold
4th Real Impact
Other Tips
Race 6 – English
Race 7 – Lankan Rupee
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Take note: Any of the tips in this article are simply the author’s opinion, so bet at your own risk and always gamble responsibly. Also be sure to check out the Before You Bet Twitter Page for all our thoughts in the lead up to bets! Happy punting!
