Sunday TimeformUS Highlight Horse: Moneymeister is in better form than his chief rivals

Aqueduct | Race 7 | Post Time 4:30 p.m. (ET) | Go to the TimeformUS PPs | Not already a TimeformUS member? Sign up

A number of horses are dropping in class here, so one of the primary handicapping challenges is to figure out who will maintain their form into this start. I have my doubts about a few of them. The likely favorite is Mo Diddley (#5), and he would obviously be difficult for this field to beat if he repeats his last couple of speed figures. However, he’s suddenly dropping down in class off a solid performance, and Bruce Brown is just 4 for 31 (13%, $0.70 ROI) with horses dropping in claiming price by 50 percent or more over five years.

I have even less faith in Saratoga Giro (#11), who also may take some money. It seems like Jason Servis and Michael Dubb are just acknowledging that they made a bad claim, as this horse’s form had completely fallen apart for his prior trainer. They’re now basically begging someone to take this once classy runner for $10,000.

I want to focus on horses who appear to be in better form. The one that intrigues me most is MONEYMEISTER (#9), who may get somewhat overlooked here due to the low-profile connections. This horse put in a strong late rally last time to just miss behind the favorite We Should Talk, and he was flattered when that rival returned to win here with an improved speed figure last week. He deserves extra credit for that effort, since Feb. 22 was a day on which the track appeared to be favoring speed horses. Furthermore, it’s not as if that performance came out of nowhere, since he had also run well two back when no match for the freakish performance from Where’s Rudy. The Pace Projector is predicting that he’ll get a fast pace to close into.

THE PLAY

Win: 9

Exacta Key Box: 9 with 3,5,11

Trifecta: 9 with 3,5 with 3,4,5,11