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, July 4

The Saratoga summer season kicks off with some fourth of July fireworks as the area roasts in a severe heatwave. For bettors, therefore, it’s only fitting that we get off to a hot start at the brand-new Saratoga meet by picking some winners on Saturday’s holiday program. For this weekend’s winners, let’s analyze two of the day’s four stakes races on Saturday’s 11-race card at “The Spa.” If we can cash-in on the stakes races, we’ll be well on our way to a big holiday weekend at Saratoga. Best of luck and enjoy!

Saratoga Race Course, Race 8, $500,000 Suburban Stakes presented by Subourbon Life, 4:42 p.m. ET

The Grade 2 Suburban Stakes has drawn a loaded 11-horse field of older horses, many of whom are barely a rung below the best older horses in the country. Handicappers could easily make a case for more than half of the 11 entrants to win, but the race nevertheless should come down to some of the favorites, topped by #7 Antiquarian, whose best career effort came at this track and distance last year when he defeated Sierra Leone in the Grade 1 Jockey Club Gold Cup. Antiquarian looked good winning his 2026 debut in the Grade 3 Westchester Stakes at Aqueduct and comes out of loss the Grade 1 Hill ‘N’ Dale Metropolitan Handicap, which was perhaps the toughest race of the year for older horses so far. In the Met Mile, he was pushed to the lead against his natural stalking running style, but in this race, he projects to get an absolutely ideal pace scenario behind #2 Forged Steel, #6 Phileas Fogg, and maybe even #1 Classicist, who will all be dealing with each other up front. This race sets up for a stalker, and Antiquarian should be Johnny on the spot with Hall of Fame rider John Velazquez aboard. The other horse in the field who figures to benefit from an ideal pace set-up is #8 Hit Show despite the fact that he threw in a clunker last time when third in the Grade 3 Blame Stakes at Churchill Downs. Perhaps he needed a race upon his return from a trip to the Dubai World Cup, just as he did last year before he quickly rebounded to run big in his second race back from the Middle East. Finally, a horse that should also sit a prime stalking trip and who seems drastically underrated at this improving stage of his career is #9 Stars and Stripes, who has won two in a row including a victory in Keeneland’s Grade 3 Ben Ali Stakes last time out. He scored a blowout allowance win in his only lifetime outing to date at Saratoga and is very likely to slip under the radar on the tote board as a live overlay.

The Play: Bet on #7 Antiquarian (3-1) to win and play him in exacta and trifecta boxes along with #8 Hit Show and #9 Stars and Stripes.

Saratoga Race Course, Race 9, $750,000 Belmont Derby Stakes, 5:20 p.m. ET

Remember Mamba looks like the top U.S. Belmont Derby contender (Eclipse Sportswire)

The Grade 1 Belmont Derby had attracted a quality 10-horse field of 3-year-olds ready to race 1 1/8 miles on the turf for a hefty purse. The field contains several up-and-coming American turf horses plus a pair of European invaders who both should make their presence felt. #9 Title Role didn’t draw a great post position but should be the horse to beat if jockey John Velazquez can work out the trip from an outside draw. Title Role has won three of his last four races, including both the German Two Thousand Guineas and the Jumeirah Two Thousand Guineas in Dubai, where he defeated one of Saturday’s opponents, Pacific Avenue. He’s a still-improving 3-year-old whose only recent loss was a straight seven-furlong race in England, but when he races around a turn(s), he usually comes out on top. #6 Pacific Avenue is the other Euro invader in this race and also warrants consideration for Godolphin’s trainer/jockey combination of Charlie Appleby and William Buick, who are no strangers to coming to Saratoga and winning Grade 1 races. They could do so again with Pacific Avenue, who lost by just a length to Title Role when they met in Dubai and now exits a respectable third-place finish in the Irish Two Thousand Guineas that was won by 2025 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf victor Gstaad. There are plenty of American contenders in this race, as well, for those fans hoping for a more patriotic result on Saturday. The best chance among the Americans belongs to #3 Remember Mamba for Kentucky Derby-winning trainer Cherie DeVaux. Remember Mamba impressively won the first three starts of his career, including Keeneland’s Grade 3 UK Healthcare Transylvania Stakes, and he certainly was not embarrassed last time when finishing second behind the tour-de-force effort of Stark Contrast in the Grade 1 American Turf Stakes at Churchill Downs

The Play: Bet on #9 Title Role (5-1) to win and play him in exacta and trifecta boxes along with #3 Remember Mamba (7-2) and #6 Pacific Avenue (6-1).