THE British flat season moves up a gear this afternoon as Doncaster hold their opening meeting of the year. The Lincoln meeting, once the curtain-raiser for the UK season, has attracted a plethora of top-class horses but none catch the eye as much as Belardo in the Listed Doncaster Mile.

A Group 1-winning juvenile when comfortably taking the Dewhurst on soft ground, his best performance as a three-year-old was undoubtedly his last when he ran Solow to three-parts of a length in Ascot’s Queen Elizabeth II Stakes on good to soft ground. The son of Lope De Vega will absolutely relish today’s soft conditions and indeed the drop down to listed class. Early shows of evens or better about his chances smack of an April Fool’s day hangover especially in light of the form of the Varian stable who have clocked up three winners (including a Meydan Group 1) and two placings from their last six runners, so Belardo is a very confident selection to take this before going on to bigger and better things this season.

The Lincoln itself is, as ever, a wickedly competitive affair so the best advice is probably to ensure that you bet with a firm offering five places, as RaceBets are. It should be noted that although nine races are televised on the terrestrial channel, the first three appear on Channel 4 (Sky Ch 135) with the remainder switching to More 4 (Ch 139) at 3pm due to the Bahrain Grand Prix qualifying taking precedence. However the good news is that all nine races still qualify for RaceBets quarter the odds specials on TV racing!

The Bill Turner Stakes, which is often referred to as the Brockelsby Stakes, features the very first American challenger in the shape of Wesley Ward’s Create A Dream, who is certainly bred for speed. Inbred 3 x 3 to Danzig, and with Frankie on board, he is likely to have plenty of supporters. However the softer ground is one factor that may not be in his favour, even if he turns up looking like he’s a year older than the opposition, as many from his yard often do for one reason or another.

Richard Fahey also has an interesting contender in Springwood, also inbred to Danzig as it happens but this time 4 x 3, and his dam has produced a winner and a runner-up on debut from just three winners.

Hailing from the Fahey yard who have won two of the last 10 runnings, he has to be respected as a value alternative to Create A Dream. That said, no trainer has been as successful in this race as Bill Turner, who has supplied the winner on no less than six occasions over the past 20 years, with four of those coming in the last ten renewals of the race. His Crucial Moment, a Cheveley Park-bred son of Pivotal, certainly looks the part on pedigree and should be perfectly at home on soft ground.

Elsewhere the Mark Johnston-trained Dusker is of obvious interest in the opening juvenile contest at Kempton, not least because of the explosive start made by the Johnston two-year-old’s this season but also because of his pedigree. Dusker is a full-brother to Devotee, who won a maiden special-weight on debut for Tom Albertrani before running third in the Grade 1 Alcibiades at Keeneland on only her second start. He should take plenty of beating.