Daily Bargain regain the lead but Sprint Specialiser look threatening

2019-08-31

Daily Bargain returned to the top of the 2019 Besttipping table thanks to a duo of winning 16/1 advices. Steve Jones’ ultra-reliable service swapped places with Mark Your Card, who, despite securing a 50/1 winner at York, suffered a rare losing month.

With four months of the year to go, Daily Bargain are ahead by a slender one-point margin, and to add spice to the mix, Sprint Specialiser revived their flagging fortunes with superb late-August rally that earned pole position in the month’s listings, and cut the gap between them and the leaders to juts 24.3-points.  

Sprint Specialiser’s astonishing late flurry turned a potential losing month into a handsome 59.8-point yield. After a disappointing summer, they finally rediscovered the winning thread, but, oh how they left it late; with four days of the month to go things bleak. But the balance sheet was transformed thanks to wins by Holmeswood (7/1, Musselburgh, 28 August), Kinglami (12/1, Wolverhampton, 30 August) and Four Wheel Drive (12/1, Beverley, 31 August). In all, a total of 70 points were earned during this four-day feast, turning a 9.72 deficit into a 59.8-point profit – Sprint Specialiser’s best monthly return since joining Besttipping last summer.

After a slow start to the month, Steve Jones’ Daily Bargain enjoyed two successive winning Saturday’s thanks to a brace of Newmarket winners: West End Girl (8/1, 10 August) and Case Key (16/1, 17 August). Five days later, What’s The Story secured a second 16/1 strike for Jones, with victory in the Clipper Logistics Handicap on the second day of York’s Ebor Meeting. August’s 14-point yield, Daily Bargain’s sixth profitable month of 2019 was just enough to sneak into first place in the 2019 table, with a 90.8-point yield up to the end of August.

Having secured the June and July crowns, Mark Your Card were looking for a treble, but instead posted a small 6.5-point loss. The month began smartly with the successes of 14/1 advice Gendarme at Epsom (1 August) and Zac Brown (8/1, Chelmsford City, 3 August). Then followed a quiet phase before the victory of 50/1 Tamreer at York (23 August), which helped to offset earlier losses.

Passing Fashion, successful at Lingfield on 3 August at 7/2 and Sir Ron Priestley, the 7/4 winner of Goodwood’s March Stakes three weeks later, ensured that Personal Info’s Saturday-Only service would end August in the black. A modest 0.7-point yield, but a gain is a gain.

For others, August was a testing month; Probets, First Favourite and Personal Info all missed out by tantalizingly small margins.

What will September bring? The last classic and plenty of top-notch action on the Flat and, of course, the jumping fraternity start to dust down the Barbour jackets. Whether the destiny of the 2019 Besttipping title will be any clearer by the end of September remains to be seen.