US racing tips: Shane Ketteridge's top Belmont Derby and Belmont Oaks advice

Concert Hall
9.06pm Belmont Park
2pts win

Stolen Base
10.12pm Belmont Park
1pt each-way

Chad Brown is well represented with three of the ten fillies who are set to go to post for the 44th running of the $700,000 Grade 1 Belmont Oaks Invitational Stakes but this prize can head to Europe again with out to give Aidan O’Brien back-to-back wins in this race.

The Irish handler won this last year with Santa Barbara and in Concert Hall he has a filly with a very similar profile. Both ran good races while finishing just out of the frame in the Oaks at Epsom before running in the Pretty Polly Stakes at the Curragh over this trip of 1m2f.

This impeccably bred daughter of Dubawi is progressing nicely. She is Group 1-placed having finished third behind Homeless Songs in the Irish 1,000 Guineas and looked as though she was caught out by the soft ground when finishing fourth in the Pretty Polly last time out.

She should get much better ground to run on here as the weather forecast in the area is predicting plenty of sunshine. That is sure to suit this filly who should be delivered with a winning run late in the stretch under Ryan Moore, who knows how to win around here.

Michael Maker has won the $1,000.000 Grade 1 Belmont Derby Invitational Stakes on two previous occasions with King David in 2012 and Henley’s Joy in 2019 and he has every chance of adding a third win to that tally with Stolen Base, who can go close from a perfect draw in stall two.

This colt carries a very high level of form. As a two-year-old he finished a close second behind Tiz The Bomb (who reopposes here) in a hotly contested Grade 2 at Keeneland before finishing mid-pack in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf.

However, it’s his latest effort at Churchill Downs which leads me to believe that he could win this. That was in the Grade 2 American Turf Stakes and, having encountered traffic trouble early, he had to swing four wide and kicked clear in the straight under Flavien Prat to win by a comfortable length and a quarter.

Luis Saez takes the ride this time around and he can get a good spot in behind the leaders before moving clear and kicking on into the straight. They could take some stopping from there with this step up in trip also expected to suit.

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