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 SatuTalking 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

1. Start simple with an easy guide for how to bet on horse racing.
2. Not sure what that word means? Horse racing terminology is a language of its own. Allow us translate for you
3. What the heck is a speed figure? This beginner’s guide to speed figures has everything you need to know.
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.
5. We all make mistakes when it comes to betting on horse racing, here are eight lessons learned from experience.
6. Figure out how much each bet will cost in advance with our Gambling Calculator, presented by NYRA Bets.

NYRA Bets Haskell Stakes Day is not only the biggest and best day of the year at the Monmouth Park summer meet, it is also one of the best days of racing and wagering of the entire summer season. The 3-year-olds take center stage in the $1 million Haskell, but they are not the only game in town this Saturday as Monmouth hosts a total of six stakes races on its headline 14-race program. The feature race on the undercard will be the Grade 2 United Nations Stakes on the grass, which will run for a purse of $600,000. For this weekend’s winners, let’s concentrate on the United Nations and the Haskell. If we can pick the winners of these two top events, we will be well on our way to a profitable day this Saturday. Best of luck.

Saturday, July 20

Monmouth Park, Race 11, $600,000 United Nations Stakes, post time 5:09 p.m. ET

The Grade 2 United Nations Stakes has attracted a full field of 12 older horses set to run 1 3/8 miles on the turf, which at Monmouth happens around three turns. It just so happens that the three top contenders in this race all have drawn on the far outside, if that’s not too big of a pill for you to swallow. #10 Webslinger has been good form in his recent races, owns a win in his only prior appearance on the Monmouth turf, and exits a stakes win with a strong speed figure at this distance in his last race which makes him the horse to beat vs. the U.N. field. The horse Webslinger will need to battle it out with will be #12 Far Bridge, a former Grade 1 winner who exits an in-the-money finish at the Grade 1 level in his last race in the Resorts World Casino Manhattan Stakes where he lost to the likes of Measured Time and Nations Pride, either of whom would likely be favored in this race. Far Bridge draws the far outside, which won’t help, but he earned a 100 Beyer Speed Figure in his last race which is the best last-race speed figure in the field, and he’ll be tough to defeat if able to repeat that performance vs. these. Jockey Jose Ortiz is off Webslinger in favor of Far Bridge. Another of the top contenders in this race is also drawn far outside and that is #11 Starting Over, who, like Webslinger, is also exiting a stakes win in a race at this 1 3/8-mile distance. Starting Over’s form has been excellent so far this year and the outside shouldn’t be enough to derail him with his late-closing running style.

The Play: Bet to win on #10 Webslinger (9-2) and play him in exacta and trifecta boxes along with #11 Starting Over (6-1) and #12 Far Bridge (4-1).

Monmouth Park, Race 12, $1,000,000 NYRA Bets Haskell Stakes, post time 5:45 p.m. ET

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The Grade 1 Haskell Stakes is one of the most important races of the year in the 3-year-old division, and not surprisingly it has drawn a fabulous field of eight 3-year-olds including several graduates of the 2024 Triple Crown season. The field is led by the 1-2 finishers from last month’s Belmont Stakes Presented by NYRA Bets, #1 Dornoch and #7 Mindframe, as well as the last year’s 2-year-old champion #5 Fierceness, who has had an up-and-down season so far as a 3-year-old with a win in the Grade 1 Curlin Florida Derby Presented by Hill ‘n’ Dale Farms at Xalapa followed by a disappointing 15^th-place finish when favored in the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve. Fierceness very well may again be able to rebound, but this will be a tough spot in his first race in the 2 ½ months since the Kentucky Derby, and while he’s loaded with ability, he’s just too inconsistent to be able to trust in the win position. Dornoch was the Belmont Stakes winner and is an obvious contender here based on anything close to a repeat of that last effort. He was able to edge Mindframe when Mindframe faltered in the stretch of the 1 ¼-mile Belmont Stakes, but this shorter 1 1/8-mile trip seems to fit Mindframe like a glove and gives him a great chance to turn the tables. Mindframe was making only his third career start in the Belmont Stakes, which makes him the horse in this race with the most upside should he continue his promising career trajectory.

The Play:  Bet #7 Mindframe (9-5) to win. The chalk makes sense in this race, so instead of exactas, just play trifecta boxes or straight exactas using Mindframe along with #1 Dornoch (5-2) and #5 Fierceness (5-2).