God's Tipster's Friday Belmont at Aqueduct Pick: Race 9 is a turf route for New York-breds, one has speed edge

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Thursday’s Race Recap from Aqueduct:

(All odds US)

Belmont at Aqueduct:

Race 1: 5th@ 3.85/1

Race 3: 10th@ 25.25/1

Race 9: SCRATCH

In Race 1, Splashy broke fine but with nobody pressing the fleet-footed Shaman Princess that one was able to hold on for the gate to wire score. Splashy splashed home fifth. In Race 3, Avalanche is Comin went to the front and set a slow pace but stopped to a walk turning for home and was eased late.

I’m staying at Aqueduct for Friday’s races. We’re expecting nice weather with unseasonably warm temperatures with fast and firm conditions. Let’s get to work!

Belmont at Aqueduct:

Race 9: Slapintheface - 1 pt win (US Morning Line Odds: 5/2)

Turf runners bred in New York go a mile and a sixteenth. Not everyone agrees with Beyer speed figures, but one thing I’ve found over the years to be true is that when a turf runner has a sizable speed figure difference over his competitors, the class usually prevails. Such is the case for Slapintheface, who enters today’s maiden event with back-to-back narrow defeats. Tony O actually has numbers that aren’t too far behind Slapintheface, but aside from those two nobody has turf form that can compete. I prefer Slapintheface to Tony O because they’ve faced each other twice and Tony O has come out on the short end both times. There won’t be much pace early on, but Slapintheface looks like he should have an edge here at 5/2 odds look fair.

Best of luck to all our members playing Friday’s races from Aqueduct!