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 Talking Horses, and on broadcast TV on WAVE-3 Louisville, ABC KOLO-8 in Reno, Nevada, and channel 72 Long Island Cablevision.

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 fall racing season in New York continues this weekend at Aqueduct with another highly playable 10-race program scheduled this Saturday. The two feature races on the card are turf stakes races, and both the Jockey Club Oaks and the Knickerbocker Stakes have drawn excellent fields. For this weekend’s winners, let’s pick the top finishers of these two headline races and we will be well on our way to a big day at the Big A. Best of luck.

Saturday, Nov. 15

Aqueduct, Race 7, $350,000 Jockey Club Oaks, post time 2:39 p.m. ET

A tremendous field of eight 3-year-old fillies has been assembled for the Grade 3 Jockey Club Oaks at 1 3/8 miles on the turf. The race drew a field that includes most of the principals in the division other than Nitrogen and Lush Lips. #4 Fionn scored a headline win in this summer’s Grade 1 Belmont Oaks Invitational Stakes where she beat Nitrogen, who went on to finish second in the Longines Breeders’ Cup Distaff. Add that to Fionn’s win in Churchill Downs’ Grade 3 Regret Stakes at 1 1/8 miles, and in Kentucky Downs’ Grade 3 Blackwood Dueling Grounds Oaks Invitational Stakes at 1 5/16 miles, and you have a filly that’s had one heckuva year. Both of Fionn’s 2025 losses came on less-than-firm turf, so if the course is firm this Saturday, she could be tough to beat. Another major factor in this year’s 3-year-old filly division in this race is #7 Laurelin, who won her first five lifetime outings including a win in the Grade 2 Fasig-Tipton Saratoga Oaks Invitational Stakes going 1 3/16 miles on Aug. 9. The only thing standing in her way from an undefeated 3-year-old season was her second-place finish last time in Keeneland’s Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup Stakes Presented by Dixiana, and there’s certainly no shame in that. The big guns are lined up in this race, but there still looms the possibility of an upset and that’s because of the presence of #1 Scythian, who is likely to slip under the radar at morning-line odds of 8-1. Scythian made her seasonal debut on the main track on Aug. 30 and then lost her prep for this race last time by a length due to a brutally bad trip. She was the easy winner of last fall’s Grade 2 Miss Grillo Stakes on this course in New York’s premier turf race for 2-year-old fillies, and she should be ready for a return to her best form now in her third start back from the sidelines. If you get a chance to get a Bill Mott-trained horse at a good price in a race like this, go for it.

The Play: Bet on #1 Scythian (8-1) to win and play her in exacta and trifecta boxes with #4 Fionn (2-1), and #7 Laurelin (8-5).

Aqueduct, Race 9, $150,000 Knickerbocker Stakes, post time 3:39 p.m. ET

The $150,000 Knickerbocker Stakes has drawn a field of eight challengers ready to go 1 1/8 miles on the turf (plus one main-track-only horse). #3 Trikari was a classy multiple graded stakes winning turfer as a 3-year-old including a Grade 1 win at Aqueduct and now he has found the right spot for the breakthrough race of his 4-year-old season. Trikari got a comeback race under his belt off a 3 ½-month layoff with a third-place prep race last time and can score a knockout vs. this field based on his better efforts. #7 Air Recruit is another horse due for a return to form in this race after coming up short last time in the Grade 3 FanDuel TV Mint Millions Invitational Stakes at Kentucky Downs, which is a course some horses handle, and some do not. If you can forgive him for that loss, he appears to have found a much better spot here based on his two good-looking turf wins this summer with solid speed figures, including the $110,000 Oceanport Stakes at Monmouth Park. Another horse with speed figures that stack up well against this field is #4 Ohana Honor, who is making his third start of the season after posting good speed figures in the two recent outings. He perhaps would prefer more distance but has shown enough ability at distances similar to this one to give him a chance vs. this field.

The Play: Bet on #3 Trikari (4-1) to win and play him in exacta and trifecta boxes with #4 Ohana Honor (7-5) and #7 Air Recruit (3-1).