Boodles Chester May Festival Day 1 Tips: Ali Shuffle is ready to rumble

Chester’s May meeting begins on Wednesday afternoon with a cracking seven-race card to get stuck into.

Wednesday’s feature races include the Vase and the Cheshire Oaks, often key trials at this point of the season.

We have picked out a trio of selections to follow on Wednesday including a last-time-out winner who looks capable of another big run.

13:30 Chester - Ali Shuffle @ 13/8

The advantage of a low draw at Chester has been well covered down the years but it’s particularly important to have a decent gate over the minimum trip and one who looks capable of going well in Chester’s season opener is ALI SHUFFLE from stall one.

Karl Burke’s representative is unbeaten in her two starts. She followed a two-length success at Redcar last month, where the filly was good value for the winning margin, with a narrow success at Beverley against 11 rivals.

Having just about done enough in the closing stages at Beverley, she gives the impression that there’s more under the bonnet and the pace she showed from the front at there will be a useful asset at this course from the inside gate, where she may be able to dominate her rivals from the front.

Furthermore, the form of both of her wins is working out very nicely. The third from her success in the North East has come out and won since, the only runner from the first six at Redcar to have reappeared.

The Beverley form has also had significant form boosts with two of the three that have run subsequently also winning, including the runner-up, a nice prospect from Tim Easterby’s stable.

Sam James who retains the ride is a good judge of pace, a factor that is critical around the tight turns of Chester, and it’s a slight surprise this filly isn't a stronger favourite for a team that excel with their juveniles.

14:05 Chester - Seraphim Angel @ 10/1 

Another with a low draw on Wednesday is Seraphim Angel who was a highly progressive filly as a juvenile last term.

She won twice, including over this course and distance before finding herself a bit out of her depth in Group 3 company at Dundalk towards the end of the campaign. She shaped like she would come on from her recent return at Wolverhampton and a mark of 84 should be workable in handicaps this term. It’s also worth noting that the yard often targets this meeting and Richard Kingscote rides the track particularly well.

15:05 Chester - Convergent @ 5/1

It looks like a cracking renewal of the first Classic of the season on Saturday and several of these met in the course and distance Craven Stakes last month when FIELD OF GOLD ran out a mightily impressive winner. He’s taken to confirm that form here with several factors in his favour.

This son of Kingman looked like he would come on for the run when assessed in the preliminaries to the Craven, carrying plenty of condition, and there’s also a solid chance that there’s more to come if he settles better in the early stages of the race given that he raced keenly early on last month.

He was a Group 3 winner as a juvenile and got the better of last year’s Group 2 Royal Lodge winner on his reappearance, Wimbledon Hawkeye, who proved no match for the turn of foot the selection produced in the closing stages of the Craven.

He’s looked well suited to a sound surface, with his only defeat since his debut coming on soft ground in France and everything points to a bold show here with the yard having been in cracking form since the beginning of the turf season.

He looks capable of giving John Gosden a first 2,000 Guineas win which would be an apt success given that the trainer went so close with Field Of Gold’s sire in this race in 2014.

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