Welcome to Noel Michaels’ Weekend Winners, the place to go for weekend best bets and spot plays from veteran handicapper and tournament-play pioneer Noel Michaels. Check back every week for a couple of highlighted selections designed to help you cash a few bets and make some money.

Noel's selections have been featured just about everywhere horse racing picks can be found, including in print in the Daily Racing Form, The HorsePlayer Magazine and American Turf Monthly, online at DRF.com, Twinspires.com and USRacing.com, from the paddock on-track at Arlington International Racecourse, and on the air on HRTV, TVG, NYC OTB Extra, NYRA's Talking Horses, and on broadcast TV on WAVE-3 Louisville, ABC KOLO-8 in Reno, Nevada, and channel 72 Long Island Cablevision.

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Six Beginner Betting Tools

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4. Betting on horse racing can be intimidating. Team ABR put together some Dos and Don’ts for the new fan getting started betting on racing.
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The 2023 Saratoga meet has been in full swing for a few weeks, and now we have finally arrived at the first true headline Saturday of the season. Whitney Stakes Day on Saturday, Aug. 5 features a stellar 12-race card that is loaded with six stakes races including a trio of Grade 1 events. The star power on hand for the program includes the likes of Breeders’ Cup champions Cody’s Wish and Caravel and Longines Kentucky Oaks heroine Pretty Mischievous. Perhaps one who is ready to add her name to the roll call of stars is Maple Leaf Mel, who will try to knock off Pretty Mischievous in the Grade 1 Test Stakes. A very bettable undercard race, the Lure Stakes, is also on the card. It should be a heckuva Saturday at Saratoga. Enjoy the racing and good luck.

Saratoga Race Course, Race 7, $135,000 Fasig-Tipton Lure Stakes, post time 3:51 p.m. ET

This $135,000 restricted stakes race going 1 1/16 miles on the turf may be the lowest-profile stakes race on the Saturday Saratoga card, but it certainly looks like a good betting race. The horse to beat is #1 Portfolio Company, who looked fairly bulletproof in his recent back-to-back turf wins at Belmont Park. He is in the best form of his career now for Saratoga’s leading trainer Chad Brown, and he has already proven a liking for Saratoga with wins on this inner turf course both of the last two years. Ireland-based trainer James Stack is bringing back his Fasig-Tipton Belmont Oaks Invitational Stakes winner Aspen Grove to compete in the Saratoga Derby Invitational Stakes later on the Saturday card, and he seems to have found an ideal kind of spot here in the Lure with his other invader entered on the day, which is #6 Chazzesmee, who exits a solid second-place finish in an 18-horse race worth €109,000 at the Curragh last time out. Jockey Oisin Murphy, who rode Aspen Grove to victory at Belmont, will be aboard this gelding.

The Play: Bet to win on #1 Portfolio Company (7-2), and box him in the exacta along with #6 Chazzesmee (12-1).

Saratoga Race Course, Race 8, $500,000 Test Stakes, post time 4:26 p.m. ET

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#8 Maple Leaf Mel is a monstress who seems fairly obvious in this prestigious seven-furlong race for 3-year-old fillies, but since she somehow hasn’t even been favored in her last two wins, I figured she’s worth a pick. Maple Leaf Mel has begun her career with a perfect 5-for-5 record including back-to-back Grade 3 wins in her last two races in the Miss Preakness Stakes Presented by Case Tractor at Pimlico and the Victory Ride Stakes at Belmont Park. She has never been headed in any of her five wins to date, and at no point at any time in any of those races has she ever seemed in danger of tiring or losing. She’s already 2-for-2 at Saratoga. She looks like a freak and is the horse to beat at the Test’s seven-furlong distance, with all of her victories so far in her career coming at either six furlongs or 6 ½ furlongs. The big name in the Test is Kentucky Oaks winner #1 Pretty Mischievous, who also has since scored another Grade 1 win last time out in the Acorn Stakes Presented by Great Jones Distilling Co. at Belmont. She’s certainly not short on ability, but the question with her today is the cutback in distance to this seven-furlong sprint – a distance shorter than in any of her recent outings. Because she’s in the race, Maple Leaf Mel, once again, may not even be favored. Instead of Pretty Mischievous, exacta players might want to concentrate on a pair of talented young sprinters like #5 Interpolate who finished second by a neck in this spring’s seven-furlong Beaumont Stakes Presented by Keeneland Select at Keeneland for trainer Chad Brown, and #7 Munnys Gold, who was second by a head in the seven-furlong Eight Belles Stakes Presented by Sysco at Churchill Downs for trainer Todd Pletcher.

The Play:  Bet #8 Maple Leaf Mel (2-1) to win and key her atop exactas above #5 Interpolate (15-1) and #7 Munnys Gold (7-2). Also, key Maple Leaf Mel atop trifectas using three horses, Interpolate, Munnys Gold, and #1 Pretty Mischievous (9-5), underneath.