Canny, very canny

My dad was incredibly canny although he tried hard to hide it sometimes.

Glorious Goodwood always saw him at his most canny. Despite not following racing closely, he always managed to come away with a profit. My brother and I, who paid considerably more interest, managed infrequent wins. I used to rely on getting the short priced winner of a two year-old maiden late in the day to get back somewhere close to breaking even.

His strategy was:

• Back anything trained by Mark Johnston or Mick Channon, preferably each way

Especially:

• Any two year-old horse trained by Channon
• Any horse trained by Johnston, running in a handicap

In addition, he would also back any horse trained by Dandy Nicholls running over five furlongs.

On the way I went last year, the first since dad died, this strategy yielded winners at 11/4 and 8/1.

So, I'm going to do it all over again this year. Annoyingly Mark Johnston has a lot of runners.

Day One

• 1st race

A Johnston horse won the opening race of the meeting at 8/1! He had two in the race and I backed the one that came 4th.

• 2nd race

Urban Poet, Johnston's horse came 3rd at 6/1. I backed it each way so there's a little in the bank (but not much).

• 3rd race

No runners

There are a further four races left today:

• 4th race

Mick Channon has an outsider in this at around 14-1 so there's a couple of quid each way invested there two.

• 5th race

Mark Johnstone has three here and I've put a little on two so you can bet that the third one will win.

• 6th race

Nothing here

• 7th race

Mark Johnston has the favourite. No bet made yet.

Come on the canny man!