After you’ve played today’s re-scheduled races from King’s Plate Day (see updated analysis here), what horses will stoke your Saturday interest and play? How about one of my top two favourite conditions: maiden races? Six of the 11 races at Woodbine are for horses who haven’t won a race.

When I had an inside source at Woodbine in the 1990s who knew how well the babies were training, I bet as much as $1,000 on first-time starters. His word was gold (or brown). Since he is no longer there, rules have had to replace inside information and there’s much less certainty about the prospects of first-time starters, but you go with what you have.

What IS certain, though, are the prospects of maidens who have had two or more starts because of the added-up numbers rule. You add where a horse finished last time with the horse’s position at the first call of his previous race. The horses with the lowest added-up numbers are the main contenders.

If you have an abundance of patience and just waited for maiden races where all horses have had a few races under their cinch straps, you’d do very well just using that rule. And you would catch some nice longshots in your superfecta boxes. Never tried it? Apply this rule at random on maiden races without betting to see what happens. You’ll become a believer.

And what about maiden races where horses have fewer than two starts? (1) Look for high-percentage trainers with good stats with babies; (2) Look for high-percentage jockey/trainer combos; (3) Look for horses with the quickest workouts and regular weekly works; (4) Look for horses with a troubled or slow first start. Put a line through that meaningless race. (5) Look for second-time horses who were bet down in their debut race; (6) Examine debut-sire stats. They’re available online from DRF and the DRF often cites the percentage in “A Closer Look” under each horse in the DRF program. (7) For turf races, check the Tomlinson turf breeding stat for each horse. There are occasional monster payouts boxing the top Tomlinson horses.

So, using those maiden rules as well as others, who are the contenders in Saturday’s six maiden races?

• Race 1, 7-furlong maiden claimer: #7 Ontario Holiday has the highest 7-furlong Equibase speed figure of 67. Horses with the lowest added up numbers: #8 with 4 and #4,5,6 with 7. All of which makes your superfecta wheel: 7/4,5,6,8/4,5,6,8/4,5,6,8. Play #7 in the second position as well.
• Race 5, maiden claiming turf sprint: Low added-up numbers—1,2,7,10,11. Top jockeys are riding first-time starter #5 and second-time starter #4. Highest Tomlinson figure: #1 (382)
• Race 6, 7 1/2-furlong maiden turf allowance: Highest 7-furlong speed figures: #2 and #6 both have 81. #6 also has low added-up number of 7. #1 has second best 7-furlong speed of 73. Superfecta wheel is obvious: 2,6/2,6/1/ALL and 2,6/2,6/ALL/1 and 2,6/ALL/2,6/1.
• Race 7, two-year-old maiden allowance: Very tricky because lots of first-time starters. Mark Casse has #2 and #6 with top jocks. He also has #5 (10-1) who was favoured when she finished fourth in her debut. #7 Just Like That could prove dangerous at 15-1 because she has a high pace number of 89 that will put her on the lead again, with the chance she will take it all the way this time. The jockey/trainer combo winning stat is 30 per cent.
• Race 9, 7 ½-furlong maiden turf allowance: #2 Nantuckets Day (6-1) has the highest 7-furlong speed figure of 81 but #5 (7-5) comes from England where all four of her lifetime races were at the 7-furlong specialist distance. The three-year-old finished second, third and fourth overseas.
• Race 11, maiden optional turf route claimer: #5 Empire’s Treat (4-1) has the best turf closing fraction in the race.

BETTING: Playing a pick-3 in races 5 to 7 is obvious. Also, you may use those races to construct a pick-6 starting in race 6, a pick-5 starting in race 7 or a pick-4 starting in race 8. Good luck today, too, in winning a share in the mandatory payout pick-6 and the mandatory Jackpot Hi-5 in the re-scheduled King’s Plate Day races.

~ by Ivan Bigg