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.

Noel Michaels’ Weekend Winners is brought to you by Horseplayers.com, the official online qualifying site of the Breeders' Cup Betting Challenge (BCBC) and National Horseplayers Championship (NHC). Horseplayers.com offers low-cost feeders every day and BCBC and NHC qualifiers every weekend, and it’s the only site where you can qualify for the $1.25 million BCBC. It’s free to sign up – click here to get information about registering and how to enter contests.

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.

The 2024 Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve is finally here, and the race itself and the entire May 4 undercard will comprise some of the best racing and wagering horse racing has to offer. Horseplayers have been waiting for months for the Derby, and the run for the roses will be the centerpiece of a 14-race program at Churchill Downs that will include eight other stakes races. Along with the Kentucky Derby, this weekend’s winners will include a closer look at one of the day’s other Grade 1 races, the $1 million Churchill Downs Stakes Presented by Ford, which has the potential to yield an upset and some big-priced payoffs that could serve as a bankroll builder for the Derby. I wish you an exhilarating Kentucky Derby Day. Best of luck!

Saturday, May 4

Churchill Downs, Race 10, $1,000,000 Churchill Downs Stakes Presented by Ford, post time 4:31 p.m. ET

The Grade 1 Churchill Downs Stakes has drawn an 11-horse field set to race seven furlongs on the main track for a million-dollar purse. The field is loaded with quality and should be a great betting race, and some of the most high-profile challengers in the field appear to be vulnerable. This sets up the possibility of an upset. For example, the morning-line favorite #6 Zozos is returning from a layoff and will be competing at a distance shorter than his best, and second choice #11 Hoist the Gold, who won last fall’s Grade 2 Cigar Mile Handicap, is making his first start since returning from the Middle East. Instead of taking a short price, why not bet some horses at good odds instead? One potential upsetter is #3 Bo Cruz, who exits a big win in Keeneland’s Grade 3 Commonwealth Stakes held at seven furlongs, where he prevailed despite having to battle for the lead. That cutback in distance seemed to work wonders for Bo Cruz who had been struggling in two-turn races. Besides his win in the Commonwealth, Bo Cruz’s other top career effort was an allowance win at Churchill Downs on last year’s Kentucky Derby undercard. Along with Bo Cruz, a case can also be made in this spot for fellow longshot #1 Raise Cain, who is also well-suited for this distance and also would love an off-track based on his win in the 2023 Gotham Stakes in the slop at Aqueduct. Raise Cain won Keeneland’s Perryville Stakes last fall and will be looking to rebound from a subpar outing last time out in the Commonwealth Stakes when he seemed to need the race off a layoff. Finally, #2 Tejano Twist is a horse difficult to ignore in this spot despite the fact that seven furlongs is a furlong further than his preferred distance. Tejano Twist gets Irad Ortiz Jr. aboard, owns a stakes win over this track, and finally gets away from Skelly, perhaps the best sprinter in the country right now, who beat him in two of his last three races.

The Play: Bet to win on #3 Bo Cruz (10-1). Play three-horse exacta and trifecta boxes along with #1 Raise Cain (20-1) and #2 Tejano Twist (4-1).

Churchill Downs, Race 12, $5,000,000 Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve, post time 6:57 p.m. ET

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The Kentucky Derby is the race everyone is waiting for. A field of 20 is set to run for the roses at a distance of 1 ¼ miles and at least half the horses in the race are legitimate contenders. Inside posts have a brutally bad record in the Derby dating back 40 years, and therefore it’s recommendable to toss out both #1 Dornoch and #2 Sierra Leone. The latter is a closer likely to find himself buried on the rail inside and/or behind 19 rivals in the early running. Good luck from there. Dornoch, meanwhile, will need to send hard from the kiss-of-death rail post, not only lessening his chances of going all the way but also ensuring a fast pace and hurting the chances of fellow early speed horses like #12 Track Phantom and the morning-favorite, #17 Fierceness. The Derby pace is usually too fast anyway, and this year’s race certainly looks like no exception. Fierceness is a must-use in the exotics, but he’s not a great play to win at expected low odds. Let’s focus our search for a winner on late-running horses with slightly better post positions than Sierra Leone and at much better prices. Originally, that horse was going to be Grade 2 Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby winner #4 Catching Freedom, who shows a highly desirable improving pattern in every career race for trainer Brad Cox. Unfortunately, his post draw is only marginally better than Sierra Leone’s. The other perfect set-up closer in this race with a better post is #7 Honor Marie, and as a 20-1 longshot on the morning line, he is going to be my boom-or-bust top pick to catch Fierceness in the late stages for the Kentucky Derby victory. Honor Marie was a graded stakes winner at Churchill Downs as a 2-year-old, but then he needed a race when fifth in his 3-year-old debut in the Grade 2 Risen Star Stakes at Fair Grounds. The Risen Star turned into this prep season’s ultimate key race (winner Sierra Leone won the Toyota Blue Grass Stakes, third-place Catching Freedom won the Louisiana Derby, and fourth-place #19 Resilience won the Wood Memorial Stakes Presented by Resorts World Casino). Honor Marie took another step forward when second by a length in the Louisiana Derby last time. Now he's ready to take the biggest step forward of all to become the upset winner of the 150^th Kentucky Derby.

The Play:  Bet #7 Honor Marie (20-1) to win and box him in the exacta and trifecta with #4 Catching Freedom (8-1), #17 Fierceness (5-2), and #19 Resilience (20-1).