SELECTIONS - 18 August 2006

POOMA selections:

There are no POOMA selections today

Non-POOMA selections (and ruffies in red below):

Cranbourne 4-7
Ipswich 4-7

Lay of the Day: Cranbourne 4-2 Cashew $2.60; started 7/4 favourite when tailed off behind Jumlah in a Listed race at its only start. Underwent a vet's examination and was passed fit to run that day so people might follow up on it - [LOTD 10 from 13]

Today: Not much of a day to have a go, I reckon. At Goulburn I'd watch the Nick Olive and Matthew Dale trained runners, as both of them have good strike rates. At Ipswich I'd watch runners from the usual suspects, Alan Bailey and Shaun Dwyer, who have a few chances today. Fraschetti might be good odds in race 4 at Cranbourne with Cashew in the race. Other than that, I'll spend the time looking at tomorrow's form.

Yesterday: Sea Zulu went out a $1.70 favourite at Townsville with his 59kg and was narrowly beaten by the very good sprinter, Crafty King, who carried 58.5kg. Sea Zulu had won 7 from 10 and Crafty King 11 from 28 but that also included 7 of his last 10 most of those at the 1000m trip whereas Sea Zulu, coming off a couple of 1200m runs, wasn't quite sharp enough at the finish. None of that changes my opinion that Sea Zulu is easily up to metropolitan Saturday class but he wasn't entitled to be odds on with Crafty King in the race yesterday. The two I picked out in race 3 finished 2nd and 3rd with On Bail narrowly missing out. As I always point out, watch for southern horses having their first run up in Far North Queensland. The one I picked out at Northam, Underestimated, didn't handle the step up in grade, though I don't think that racing on the pace suited it at all.

POOMAs: There were no POOMA selections yesterday.

LOTD: Freaky Kontiki started at $5.80, which is longer than we look for (picks must be less than $3 on the morning line after scratchings), and led for a fair while before being run down and finishing a good 2nd.