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 Saratoga meet shifts into high gear as the calendar flips to August, and the quality of racing and wagering could not be any better. Case in point: this Saturday’s 13-race card headlined by the $1 million Whitney Stakes. For Whitney selections from myself and the staff at America’s Best Racing, see ABR’s separate trifecta picks article. The Whitney is not the only game in town Saturday at the Spa, however, because the race is one of four Grade 1 races on the program. For this weekend’s winners, let’s delve into two of the day’s other Grade 1 events, the FanDuel Fourstardave Stakes and the Test Stakes Presented by Ticketmaster. If we can pick some winners in these high-profile races late in the card, we will be well on our way to a successful day at the Spa. Best of luck.

Saratoga, Race 8, $750,000 FanDuel Fourstardave Stakes, post time 3:52 p.m. ET

The Grade 1 Fourstardave Stakes has attracted a field of 10 top turf horses hoping to come out on top going one mile. The big story in the race has to be #3 Johannes, who returns for his 5-year-old debut off a seven-month layoff and will be seeking his first career win outside of California. He will be among the favorites so you will have to take a stand either for or against him when you are betting this race, and I indeed will be getting on board the Johannes bandwagon despite the question marks. He went 5-for-6 in his spectacular 2024 campaign with the only loss coming by three-quarters of a length in the FanDuel Breeders’ Cup Mile Presented by PDJF. It’s reasonable to suspect that he’s ready to roll off the layoff or else trainer Tim Yakteen would not have opted to ship him across country for such a high-profile race. In reality, he travelled all this way for this race’s Breeders’ Cup Challenge Series “Win and You’re In” expense-paid entry into the BC Mile, and he should get it even if he’s not 100 percent loaded off the layoff. The most intriguing challenger in the field will be #4 Think Big, a proven turf sprinter who passed his stretchout test at this course and distance last time when he won the Grade 3 Kelso Stakes in eye-catching fashion with a late surge in deep stretch. Based on that win, you can’t blame his connections for thinking big and he cannot be counted out. The other two biggest names in this field will be #7 Spirit of St Louis and #8 Deterministic, who are both shortening up from longer races to attempt this turf mile. Both are Grade 1 winners this season and both are contenders, but of the two, Deterministic’s speed fits better in this spot as opposed to Spirit of St Louis’s late-running style which may come-up short with only one mile to work with.

The Play: Bet on #3 Johannes (5-2) to win and play him in exacta and trifecta boxes with #4 Think Big (6-1) and #8 Deterministic (9-2).

Saratoga, Race 10, $500,000 Test Stakes presented by Ticketmaster, post time 5:04 p.m. ET

The Grade 1 Test Stakes at seven furlongs for 3-year-old fillies is always one of the most anticipated races of the Saratoga season and this year’s eight-horse field lives up to expectations. Nearly every relevant horse at the top of the division suitable for this distance is in the race, and it should be a doozy. Trainer Bob Baffert ships #4 Cash Call from California with a perfect 3-for-3 record so far this year and she looks like a good top pick at 5-1 odds on the morning line. Cash Call stretched out to two turns to win Santa Anita Park’s Grade 3 Summertime Oaks last time, but she seems like a horse that’s going to be even better if she sticks to sprints like this spot. She has tactical speed, can rate, has top connections with Flavien Prat aboard, and that last race should serve as a perfect bottom builder for this cutback to seven furlongs. The favorite in the Test will be #6 Echo Sound and she has earned that distinction with impressive back-to-back wins in the Grade 3 Miss Preakness Stakes and last time in Saratoga’s Grade 3 Victory Ride Stakes, where she earned this field’s top Beyer Speed Figure of 101. She’s obviously a major win contender and will at least be tough to keep out of the exactas and trifectas. The third horse to consider is the untested but up-and-coming #1 Ragtime, who has looked spectacular winning her first two starts for trainer Bill Mott. She gets the class test today and could earn a passing grade.

The Play: Bet on #4 Cash Call (5-1) to win and play her in exacta and trifecta boxes with #1 Ragtime (4-1) and #6 Echo Sound (9-5).