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.

Saturday, March 7

Santa Anita Park will host one of the headline days of racing and wagering of its current winter meet this Saturday on Santa Anita Handicap day, featuring an 11-race program with four graded stakes races including the Grade 1 B. Wayne Hughes Beholder Mile Stakes presented by FanDuel and the Grade 2 San Felipe Stakes presented by DK Horse for 3-year-old hopefuls on the road to the Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve. For this weekend’s winners, let’s take a closer look at two of the important stakes races on Saturday’s card at Santa Anita. Best of luck.

Santa Anita Park, Race 9, $200,000 Frank E. Kilroe Mile Stakes, 7:12 p.m. ET

El Potente (BENOIT photo)

The Grade 2 Kilroe Mile has drawn a field of eight turf horses and all eight entrants in the race are stakes winners, including four horses who are graded stakes winners. One of those graded stakes winners is #3 El Potente, who looks like the horse to beat based on his win last time in Santa Anita’s one-mile Grade 3 Thunder Road Stakes, in which he led all the way to raise his career win total on this turf course to six victories. You’ve got to love El Potente’s pace versatility, too. Although he has the speed to lead, he can also rate and doesn’t need the lead to win. Let’s attack this race by taking a stand on El Potente on top and use a variety of horses underneath him for the purposes of the trifectas. One horse who can bump up the value of the exotics is #5 Cabo Spirit, who has a legitimate chance in this spot, at least for second, at 10-1 morning-line odds. Cabo Spirit won Santa Anita’s 1 1/8-mile Grade 3 San Gabriel Stakes two races ago and just missed in the 2025 edition of this race when he finished third by less than a length. Cabo Spirit does exit a loss last time against better company in Gulfstream’s Grade 1 Pegasus World Cup Turf Invitational, as does #2 Almendares, but both horses deserve another chance here in a more suitable spot. Speaking of Almendares, he actually finished very competitively in the Pegasus World Cup Turf when able to close for third by just 1 ¼ lengths at 37.70-1 odds for a good start to his 2026 campaign. Like Cabo Spirit, he also just missed in last year’s Kilroe Mile when beaten three-quarters of a length. While lacking a signature career victory so far, Almendares has hit the board in a long list of West Coast turf races similar to this one over the course of the last two years. Finally, #4 Gas Me Up perhaps will rank as the top challenger to El Potente in this race and cannot be overlooked. He won Woodbine’s Grade 2 bet365 King Edward Stakes last year at this one-mile distance and is already proven at the graded stakes level in California two races ago with a last-to-first win at 6 ½ furlongs in the Grade 2 Joe Hernandez Stakes with a 100 Beyer Speed Figure on the opening weekend of the Santa Anita meet.

The Play: Bet on #3 El Potente (5-2) to win and play him in an exacta box with #4 Gas Me Up (7-2). Play the trifecta with #3 El Potente keyed on top of #2 Almendares (9-2), #4 Gas Me Up, and #5 Cabo Spirit (10-1) in the second and third slots.

Santa Anita Park, Race 10, $300,000 Santa Anita Handicap Presented by Yaamava’ Resort and Casino at San Miguel, 7:43 p.m. ET

The Grade 1 “Big ’Cap” will go at 1 ¼ miles on the main track with a field of six after the early scratch of probable favorite Skippylongstocking. Let’s go with a mild upset in this race with #6 British Isles, who has converted to the dirt after spending much of his career on the turf. He has handled distances from 1 1/8 miles to 1 3/8 miles before, putting this mile-and-a-quarter assignment squarely in his wheelhouse. British Isles looked good with the switch to the main track last fall when he finished second by a half a length to Nevada Beach in the Grade 3 Native Diver Stakes at Del Mar in a race where he finished comfortably ahead of #7 Westwood, who came back to win his next race over some of these same horses in the Grade 2 San Pasqual Stakes. British Isles then was not embarrassed last time out when fifth in the $3 million Pegasus World Cup Invitational Stakes at Gulfstream Park against the likes of Skippylongstocking, White Abarrio, Full Serrano, and Disco Time, and the assignment in this race should be considerably easier. The main horse standing in British Isles’ way will be the 3-2 morning-line favorite #3 Just a Touch, who has developed an unfortunate penchant for losing as the odds-on favorite in both of his most recent races and three of his last six starts. With the absence of Skippylongstocking, bettors might have another chance to bet against him as an odds-on favorite this Saturday. Just a Touch definitely has the ability to win for trainer Brad Cox, but he’s proven throughout his career a better bet to finish second than to win. Lastly, the horse in the field listed at the highest morning-line odds, #1 Midnight Mammoth, has a legitimate chance to win, so you must include him in your wagers at 8-1 odds. Midnight Mammoth earned a very fast seven-furlong win two races ago and ran well at this 1 ¼-mile distance at Santa Anita last year when second by three-quarters of a length to Skippylongstocking in the Grade 2 Hollywood Gold Cup Stakes.

The Play: Bet on #6 British Isles (6-1) to win and play him in exacta and trifecta boxes along with #1 Midnight Mammoth (8-1) and #3 Just a Touch (3-2).