The Galway Festival enters its second day on Tuesday and Racing Post tipster Robbie Wilders highlights his three best bets across the seven-race card.
6.10 Galway
Dower House @ 1/1
2pts win
6.40 Galway
Patrick Sarsfield @ 1/1
1pt each-way
6.40 Galway
Sirjack Thomas @ 1/1
1pt each-way
Dower can live up to pedigree
The quality of summer jumping in Ireland improves significantly during Galway Festival week, but the Flat races present the best punting opportunities on Tuesday, starting with the 7f fillies’ maiden at 6.10.
Aidan O'Brien has saddled three of the last four winners of this contest and began that sequence in 2018 with subsequent dual Guineas heroine Hermosa.
Dower House is bred for Classics as a sister to the yard's 2017 dual Guineas winner Churchill and showed enough on her debut to suggest she is more than capable of landing a maiden.
The Galileo filly faded into a three-length sixth behind stablemate and subsequent Group 3 winner Never Ending Story, but that 7f Curragh maiden is always hot - top-level scorers Discoveries and Tuesday filled the first two places last term.
Dower House demonstrated plenty of ability early and can be expected to improve for the run coming from this source.
The ground is likely to be soft and while that surface is an unknown for my selection, Churchill handled it just fine and she rates the likeliest winner by some way.
Patrick and Sirjack can hit frame in feature
The Colm Quinn BMW Mile (6.40) is the standout betting race of the day and with 18 runners and enhanced placed terms up for the grabs, I want to keep two on my side.
Anything Ado McGuinness runs in this merits respect as the trainer has landed the last three runnings and both those winners feature in his team of four.
Sirjack Thomas sprung a huge surprise when bolting up by three lengths at odds of 50-1 last season and although the early market favours two of McGuinness' other contenders, I'm drawn to this seven-year-old.
Admittedly Sirjack Thomas has seven straight zeroes next to his name, but his handicap mark has fallen accordingly and he runs off 1lb lower than when successful last year.
His campaign has patently been geared around retaining his BMW Mile title and he has been raced sparingly with just three outings.
He warmed up for this when beaten just under six lengths at the Curragh a month ago and while he was successful in that same race last season en route to Ballybrit, he was running off a 9lb higher mark this time.
The Racing Post Rating he recorded was only 1lb inferior to last season’s warm-up and the stars could be aligning with testing conditions to suit.
3lb claimer Mikey Sheehy takes the ride for the first time since the 2021 festival and his draw in stall 15 is enviable as double-figure boxes have dominated recently.
Sarsfield expected to impress
Also drawn high is Patrick Sarsfield (14), who dips into a handicap for the first time in over two years for Joseph O’Brien, having competed at a much higher level in the interim.
The six-year-old began his season rated 112, but has since struggled somewhat in Group 3s and Listed contests. However, I'm sure he can be competitive dropping into a handicap off a mark of 102, with useful 5lb claimer Jake Coen aboard.
We haven't seen Patrick Sarsfield on testing ground in a while, but he finished second to the top-class Skaletti in a Longchamp Group 2 on heavy in October 2020 and I fancy him to bounce back at a price.
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