Tuesday, 23rd July 2019
Valuable big-field handicaps run up the 7f straight at Ascot are a standing feature of the flat season. We get a quartet of such events to shoot at every year….
In September it’s the Cunard Handicap – an open event for horses aged 3yo+….
In October, we get the last instalment of the quartet in the shape of the Challenge Cup – another open event for the horses aged 3yo+….
In May, we get the first instalment in the shape of the Victoria Cup – an open handicap for horses aged 4yo….
This coming Saturday, it’s the International Stakes – another open event for horses aged 3yo+….
In circumstances such as these, it can prove useful to take a consolidated view of a set of races rather than adopt a standalone perspective….
Looking at races as a group can reveal patterns, themes, features and clues that simply aren’t apparent if you’re looking at races on an individual basis….
In the run up to the weekend, most trends analysts will focus their efforts on analysing the last 10 renewals of Saturday’s race….
Fair enough. But where possible, I like to do something different. I like to get a different perspective. I like to be working with a different dataset. That way, I get a different impression of market sentiment and prices – which can be an edge….
Last night, I was looking at the last 17 big handicaps run up the 7f straight – starting with Speculative Bid’s win in the 2015 Victoria Cup and ending with Cape Byron’s win in May’s Victoria Cup….
Whilst the 10-year boys are looking at old data pertaining to a single race for their insights, my hope is to squeeze something useful out of studying the 17 most recent and valuable big-field races run up the same strip Saturday’s race will be contested on….
The first thing that struck me was the effects of the draw over the period….
The winners came from the following stalls: 23, 2, 17, 8, 29, 14, 7, 16, 18, 14, 15, 8, 13, 11, 14, 17, 10.
Just four of the seventeen winners emerged from single-figure stalls. Ten of the winners were drawn 14 or bigger….
Now look at the stall numbers of the horses that finished 2nd: 25, 18, 14, 1, 6, 22, 10, 8, 23, 26, 6, 14, 11, 18, 2, 18, 22.
It’s a similar story with five of the runner-up horses running out of a single-figure stall and ten coming out of stalls 14 or bigger….
I know it’s very fashionable these days to focus solely on pace and track-position and sectional-timing and how a race panned-out. And all that stuff is very interesting....
But draw bias hasn’t completely disappeared. Where a horse starts a race can still have some bearing on where it finishes....
Looking at these stall numbers, I’d suggest that a berth in stall 14 or higher might confer an advantage to the right horse on Saturday afternoon....
It is true to say that the lower stalls do better when you come to look at 3rd and 4th place finishers. But I’m not concerned with that....
An edge tapers out. Its effect is finite. Horses have run well from low stalls. But the high stall horses have found it just that bit easier to win and place 2nd over this 7f strip in these valuable races....
The other standout feature of the data serves to reaffirm something most of us will already be aware of – but it bears repeating….
Jamie Spencer is a real advantage to a horse up the straight at Ascot. It’s true over the sprint trips. It’s true over a mile. And it is certainly true over Saturday’s in-between trip of 7f….
Spencer took a ride in 11 of the 16 races I looked at. He won on two of them. He placed on another. And he rode two more into the top 5 – placers with any bookie offering Enhanced Place Terms and paying out on the 5th horse home….
For sure, three of those performances came on the back of one horse – Peter Chapple-Hyam’s Buckstay – who clearly thrived at the Berkshire venue....
But in these big-field races nothing is handed to you on a plate. The jockey must get the horse into the picture. And nobody does it better up the Ascot straight than Jamie Spencer....
Right now, Spencer’s weekend riding arrangements are unclear. But it is still early in the week, and if he does end up riding in the International, I’d be taking it as a big clue that he’s on something ‘live’....
Something else that caught my eye – the record of Dark Angel progeny in these races….
It’s not an angle I’d imagine you’ll be read much about anywhere else, so it’s worth mentioning on that basis alone….
The Yeomanstown Stud stallion has had 27-runners in these valuable big-field 7f handicaps at Ascot since the start of the 2015 season. Ten produced a top-7 finish....
That may not appear to be an earth-shattering figure. But in the context of a handful of races, it’s a record that stands out over and above that of any other sire on the block....
It’s a record that suggests to me that Dark Angel’s progeny are particularly well-suited to the challenge presented by the in-between 7f trip on Ascot’s idiosyncratic surface against a big-field of opponents....
I went back and looked at the entire record of Dark Angel progeny in decent handicaps (C2 or better) up the 7f straight contested by 16-horses or more.
It only goes back as far as 2013. But it’s instructive enough for our quick and dirty purposes. 37 runners produced 3 winners....
That’s not a bad record. But you get a better impression of how competitive his progeny is in these specific circumstances when you consider 14 of the 37 runners produced a top-6 finish....
That’s all from me for today.
More from me tomorrow....
Until then. Stay tuned.
Nick Pullen
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