Breeders’ Cup around the Corner

Don’t look now ladies and gentlemen but the Breeders’ Cup is sneaking up on us and horse betting faithful that want to stay ahead of the curve start early to get a good foundation under their collective belts before priming for the big day.

Recently Timeform posted its top 20 Global runners and although most of us who have not been under a rock somewhere have heard of the top gun, Curlin, some others on the list need to be followed in the next several weeks.

Duke of Marmalade was rated a pound below Curlin at 133 and a pound above recent Haskell hero Big Brown and Papal Bull.

The Duke, trained by a king in Aidan O’Brien, has not lost all year and recently hung a half length beat on Papal Bull in yet another Group 1 win at Ascot in late July.

That makes it 4 Group 1s this year in his pocket and the feeling is he has not peaked yet.

As for Papal Bull, he was 9 lengths clear of the show horse in the recent loss and he is slowly coming into form. Bull has not been favored in any of his races this year and only beat 4 rivals in his final 2007 win.

He also would likely have his hands full if he had to take on one of the runners tied for fifth on the list, Henrythenavigator.

Henry, like his stablemate The Duke, is unbeaten this year and he has a mean streak in him that heavy horse bettors love to see.

He just wants to beat you. The equine assassin beat 14 foes to kick off the year in a Group 1 at Newmarket in May, and has proceeded to win 3 other Group 1s.

Only exceptional horses never race out of the money and Henry’s 6 wins, a second and a third in his 8 starts stamps him as world class.

Interestingly, there are no other American based runners on the list and that is the reason why horse bettors have to start digging deep NOW in order to have a good game plan for the Santa Anita Breeders’ Cup in October.

Outside of the Orient based runners Sacred Kingdom, Good Ba Ba, Viva Pataca Matsurida Gogh, the Down Under runners of Weekend Hussler, Apache Cat and Miss Andretti and the lone South African Archipenko the rest of the tops in the world are from Europe.

A couple of longshot runners that horse bettors should put on their radar include Getaway and Marchand D’or.

Getaway is in the tremendous hands of Andre Fabre, who has trained 4 BC winners including Arcangues, who paid a whopping $269.20 under no other than Jerry Bailey.

The 5-year-old has won half of his 12 starts but horse bettors should get value on him. He was beaten less than 2 lengths in the Arc de Triomphe last year and had trouble in his June 6 start before another dull try in the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud.

The blood is there for him to mature with grace as he’s kin to $450,000 earner Guadalupe and the longer he runs the better.

Marchand D’or has already banked over $1.3 million and he proved he just invents ways to win. This guy is an over achiever but he’s in the very clever yard of Freddie Head and he will be value in the BC Mile if he makes the trip to Arcadia.

Horse bettors have to start to make notes and take no prisoners right now to get set for the Cup.