Lingfield horse racing best bet: Captain Kane ready to step up and lead the way

Only six runners line up for this stayers’ race, but there’s still enough betting value around for Tipstrr’s pundits to lean towards a young gelding that appears primed to get back to winning ways.

2023-07-18Lingfield horse racing best bet: Captain Kane ready to step up and lead the way

15:25 Lingfield: Buckmore Park Karting Handicap (1 mile 7 furlongs 169 yards)

With a favourite at 5/2 and the highest-priced outsider at 8/1, the bookies aren't giving much away in what appears to be a wide-open small-field handicap.

Alan King's Bit Harsh is the early market leader after hitting the ground running this year with two wins and then returning from a 108-day break to finish a close-up third of 12 (just a neck and a nose behind the winner) at Southwell just over a month ago.

His five rivals could all be said to hold serious claims to make it into the winner's enclosure, but the vote in the Tipstrr camp goes to the top-weighted and top-rated Captain Kane.

Billy Loughnane's useful three-pound claim helps boost this four-year-old gelding's chances, as indeed does the very presence in the saddle of the in-form jockey, who boasts an 18% win rate and a 51% place rate from his 67 previous rides at Lingfield.

This will be his first ride on Captain Kane, who has won seven of his 22 starts, including a hot streak of five out of six in spring 2022.

He is yet to recapture that form this summer, but he was a creditable second of seven at Ripon last month, and if he can continue that form under Loughnane over today's significant step up in trip, then he could well give the market leaders a run for their money.