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.

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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.

Belmont Stakes Day from Saratoga Race Course is here, and the 14-race Saturday card is everything handicappers had hoped for and more. The Belmont Stakes Presented by NYRA Bets headlines a program that also includes eight other stakes races that have attracted a number of the sport’s top superstars. For this weekend’s winners, let’s focus on cashing bets on the Belmont Stakes and one of Saturday’s top undercard features, the Grade 1 Woody Stephens Stakes Presented by Mohegan Sun. If we can pick the winners of these two stakes, we will be well on our way to a profitable day. Best of luck.

Saturday, June 8

Saratoga, Race 8, $500,000 Woody Stephens Stakes Presented by Mohegan Sun, post time 3:22 p.m. ET

The Woody Stephens has attracted a full 12-horse field of 3-year-olds set to go seven furlongs for a purse of $500,000. There is no shortage of legitimate contenders in this race, which will be one of the toughest on the card for handicappers. Despite drawing the rail, the horse to beat is #1 Book’em Danno, whose connections surely have had this race circled on the calendar all year long. He dominated in New York last fall when winning the $145,000 Futurity Stakes at Belmont at the Big A and has also added stakes wins at Monmouth Park and Tampa Bay Downs so far in his career. Book’em Danno exits a second-place finish in the $1.5 million Boutique Group Saudi Derby behind next-out UAE Derby Sponsored by Atlantis the Royal winner and eventual Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve third-place finisher Forever Young, who beat him by a head while the pair ended up far clear of the rest of that field. Irad Ortiz Jr. picks up the mount and the Woody Stephens’ seven-furlong distance looks ideal as long as Irad can work out a trip from the rail. The other horse to beat in this spot is #7 Prince of Monaco if he is ready to fire his best shot in his first race back from a seven-month layoff. Trainer Bob Baffert likely would not be shipping this horse from California if he was not ready to roll, and that’s a scary prospect for the other horses in this race because Prince of Monaco was unbeatable when last seen racing in sprints last year with a 3-for-3 sprint record culminating with a win in the Grade 1 Runhappy Del Mar Futurity at this seven-furlong distance. There will be plenty of dangerous horses in this field going off at good prices, but Book’em Danno and Prince of Monaco should stand out above the rest.

The Play: Bet to win on #1 Book’em Danno (9-2) and play him in exacta boxes with #7 Prince of Monaco (7-2).

Saratoga, Race 12, $2,000,000 Belmont Stakes Presented by NYRA Bets, post time 6:41 p.m. ET

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The 2024 Belmont Stakes will complete what has been a phenomenal Triple Crown series this year with a field of 10 hopefuls going 1 ¼ miles at Saratoga. Many of the principals of the Triple Crown series so far have drawn into the field including Kentucky Derby winner #3 Mystik Dan and Preakness Stakes winner #1 Seize the Grey set to square off. Usually, a Derby winner versus Preakness winner face-off in the Belmont Stakes would draw headlines, but it’s a telling sign that this year it is not even front-page news. For the purposes of the Belmont Stakes, other, fresher horses look better. The uncrowned champion in the field who is set to ascend to the top is #9 Sierra Leone, who was gallant in defeat by a nose in the Kentucky Derby after a tougher trip than the winner. The $2.3 million son of Gun Runner has already delivered on his promise with wins in this year’s Grade 2 Risen Star Stakes and Grade 1 Toyota Blue Grass Stakes. He’s never been worse than second and seems to be the best of this bunch based on talent. Closers don’t do great at 1 ¼ mile races at Saratoga, but when they do win it’s usually from outside posts. New rider Flavien Prat should work out the trip. It feels like Sierra Leone is the type of horse that can complete the rest of his 2024 campaign without ever losing another race.

As a handicapper, I feel strongly that the other horse you are supposed to be looking at in the Belmont Stakes is #6 Dornoch, who is 15-1 odds on the morning line. This is especially true if you like Sierra Leone, as the duo of Sierra Leone and Dornoch already have history together in New York when they finished noses apart in Dornoch’s Grade 2 Remsen Stakes win last fall. Dornoch’s 10^th-place Kentucky Derby finish is the definition of a toss-out race. He had a terrible trip and was already doomed from the start when suffering from a quarter crack on Derby week and then drawing the Derby “death rail,” post position 1. He has the speed that Sierra Leone lacks, and he absolutely stands out in this field as the longshot with a chance to spring the upset, or at least complete the exacta, along with his old rival Sierra Leone.

As far as the other exotics in the Belmont Stakes, it appears that any and all of the horses in the field are capable of in-the-money finishes for the back ends of your trifectas and superfectas.

The Play:  Bet favored #9 Sierra Leone (9-5) to win. Box him in the exacta with #6 Dornoch (15-1). Play both horses in the first two slots in trifectas (plus superfectas if you like) and hit the “all” button for third (and fourth). In this winning scenario, Dornoch would insure more than a sufficient payoff, even alongside the favorite.