America’s Best Racing and handicapper (and avid gambler) Monique Vág team up to provide horseplayers with their best bets of the weekend in a regular feature blog that will run on Fridays.

For some posts, Vág will try to identify a longshot play of the weekend, a nice opportunity to swing for the fences on a win bet or to take a shot with a show bet. She also will look for strong exacta plays for the weekend or occasionally try to spot a nice opportunity for other wagers.

This Weekend’s Bets

Saturday, May 27

Best Bet

Santa Anita Park, Saturday, Race 5, $300,000 Gamely Stakes, 3 p.m. ET

#6 Lady Eli: Very few mares have faced the level of adversity she has and it’s so nice to see how well she’s turned things around after her slow recovery from laminitis. She’ll hope for some honest fractions up front and I do think she’ll get that from the rail horse. She will appreciate the smaller field in this Grade 1 contest and generally the much softer competition than she is used to. I expect her to go off much lower than her morning-line odds, but she’s shown to be as good as they get on the turf.

Sunday, May 28

Best Bet

Santa Anita Park, Race 7, $200,000 Charles Whittingham Stakes, 4 p.m. ET

#2 Ashleyluvssugar: A mile and a half looked a little bit too long in that particular instance for this gelding who led most of the way last time out. He’ll be trying to put up his fifth consecutive 100+ Beyer performance and I think he’s by far the most accomplished horse in this field. Pending a good break he’ll almost certainly be either on the lead or very close pushing the pace.  The price will most likely be very short at post time, but I think the larger field makes this horse a good single in your exotics.

Exacta Box

Belmont Park, Race 7, 4:41 p.m. ET

#3 Mr Singh: He’s one of a few in here where distance is no concern for me. He’s raced at the mile and a half distance before numerous times and I think he’s best suited racing long, the longer the better. He made his North American debut last time out not only trying Lasix (furosemide) for the first time but also starting after nearly eight months off. I like the jockey upgrade to Cornelio Velazquez today and I expect him to be sharper second start off the layoff.

#6 Closing Bell: This horse has struggled mightily in 2017 with some very poor performances against much lesser competition than he was used to facing in the past. At 4, he was a Grade 1 runner and I think if he races anything like he did in some of those starts he should win this race handily. I think it’s only a matter of time before we see a big effort put forth.

#10 Montclair: This gelding is making his third start off a layoff and that’s always an interesting angle to back. Distance won’t be an issue for this gelding and although he hasn’t lit up the board in the win column, he’s done fairly well throughout the stakes ranks. He’s entered today for the $62,500 claiming price tag and I would expect a pretty big effort against a group of horses he fits well with.

Best Bet

Belmont Park, Race 8, 5:13 p.m. ET

#7 Destin: It’s interesting that exactly half the field are making their 2017 debuts so late into the season. He’s one of the only pure graded stakes horses and he’s been training well leading up towards his debut. Trainer Todd Pletcher has great stats for horses making their debut off 90+ days away and I think Destin has the class, experience, and pedigree to strike first asking in almost nine months.