SELECTIONS - 8 September 2006

POOMA selections:

There are no POOMA selections today

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

Cairns 1-2
Moe 7-9, 8-5

Today: Check out race 6 at Cairns. What a terrific contest the locals will get with Strictly Smart, Crafty King and River Hunter engaged. Crafty King has won 9 of his last 12 but keeps going around at remarkable odds and won his last start when I nominated he had terrific form when beating Sea Zulu. Strictly Smart has won 25 races from his 53 starts. His run two starts back was amazing behind Sea Zulu with the weight and barrier he had, and he then stepped up to a mile and plugged a bit when 2nd last time. River Hunter spent some time in the city and didn't have much success but if you take those runs out then his form reads 1213111151, with two of those wins at this track. David Crossland has won 6 from 7 on the Lion Hunter gelding. The slow track doesn't bring anything else into the race as far as I can see. I'll go Strictly Smart, River Hunter and Crafty King in that order. Race 7 looks like a Captain Wheland benefit however he's by General Nediym and a lot of those don't handle the worse than dead rating conditions. He's won his last 7 starts at 1000m so if he gets through the ground then you'd think he would win again. The system that Cairns 1-2 Cupbearer has come out of has been romping along at greater than 50% strike rate. This horse is first up for Roy Chillemi at 1000m, a distance he hasn't run at in his three starts and being by one of the truly bad wet track sires of all time, Grand Lodge, you wouldn't want to be taking short odds notwithstanding that he's also drawn the extreme outside barrier. I can't see anything of note at Grafton or Canberra and Moe sees a heavy track for a change. I'll be following 3-7, 5-3, 6-1, 7-3 and 9-6. If one of those last three doesn't win their leg of the quaddie then you'll know I've missed out (assuming I actually put one on).

Yesterday: Wyong was abandoned, which was unfortunate. The couple I picked out at Ballarat both ran poorly but at least you got the chance to avoid First Cru (which finished dead last as $3.10 favourite) when the horse he defeated at his last start, Aye Bee, ran 6th in race 6, which means the form was not as strong as it looked. Alan Bailey does what he does at Ipswich with two wins and a 2nd from 3 runners there, keeping his excellent record there going. Drac's Back must have lost a leg since the run at Terang that he won by 10L, setting an Australasian mile record (1:32.66) in the process. That said, the winner ran very quick time compared to the other 1400m races on the day and was less than half a second outside the track record. That horse, Jayemzed, is by Lion Cavern whose horses tend to improve with time so I'd suggest this one is on an upward form curve.

POOMAs: There were no POOMA selections yesterday.