Tuesday, 4th February 2020
Today is as good a day as any to continue with our spadework and preparation for the 2020 Cheltenham Festival....
The 4-day meeting doesn’t get underway until Tuesday 10th March. But you can put your money on the time between now and then flying past at high-speed....
No punter can do all the necessary work in the 72-hours ahead of the opening day of the meeting. But if you want to try and prove me wrong, go right ahead....
On ATC, in the meantime, we are taking the workload one chunk at a time – so that when the best 4-days of the year come around we are as ready as we can be....
Today we continue with a consolidated statistical appraisal of the four handicap hurdles race I habitually take a betting interest in at the meeting....
To reiterate the point made I have made many times previously: Festival handicaps are difficult races to win – for horses and for punters….
The whole of the National Hunt season pivots on the Cheltenham Festival. All roads seem to lead to Cheltenham in March. A horse can win a race in October and the first thing the pundits talk about is which race he’ll be going for at the Festival in the spring….
I’m not getting political. It is what it is. I’m just making the point that the 4-day Cheltenham Festival is pretty much the focal point of the jumps game....
Everybody wants a horse to be good enough to head there. Everybody wants their horses to run well there. Everybody dreams of having a winner there....
And that’s as true with handicap horses as it is with championship horses....
You could make the case that the handicap races are more competitive than the championship races....
You never see a long odds-on favourite for a handicap race. You never see a horse in a handicap so far ahead of his rivals in the formbook that he’s priced up like they’ve got no chance….
In all the handicaps, a big field always goes to post. And all the horses in that field are of a similar standard....
It’s very competitive. All of them are trying. Some will have been plotted-up – held onto all season for the Festival assignment. Nothing is being saved for another day....
The pace in Festival handicaps is always red-hot – from tapes to post. No horse wins without being good enough and tough enough to repel multiple challenges. As one opponent fades, another inevitably takes its place and asks another question....
Handicaps are tough races to win. A horse can run the race of its life in a Festival handicap – and still not win. A punter can place a cracking bet at a big price and still not be rewarded with a pay-out….
But it is the live contenders at big prices that make the handicap races must-play events for me. They are difficult puzzles to solve, but they cannot be swerved….
I don’t get involved in novice or juvenile handicap hurdle events. I prefer the open-events where I know a little more about the individual runners, their quirks, preferences and peculiarities….
None of these races is an easy puzzle to solve for punters. Quite the opposite. There are no guaranteed winners. There are no guaranteed placers. It is a case of spot the undervalued horse, take the price and then hope the horse justifies your faith on the day….
And the job is complicated further by the fact that you can’t be certain what is running until 48-hours before the off….
It doesn’t leave much time to scrutinise the form of 20-odd-runners. But at least this year (following changes made in 2018) we get two-day final declarations instead of the 24-hours we’ve had in previous years. Even the most devoted formbook aficionado struggled to do a proper form-reading job of all the runners and riders in that limited time-frame….
Ahead of time, the historic record does at least offer pointers that might come in useful when splitting fields and reducing the number of runners of interest….
I’ve been studying the last 13 renewals of the Coral Cup, the Pertemps Final and the County Hurdle – plus the 11 renewals to date of the Martin Pipe….
The situation in the handicap hurdle races at the Festival mirrors what we saw when we analysed the handicap chase events in a previous section….
The received wisdom is that you need something like a stone in hand on the handicapper to win a handicap event at the Festival….
That would mean horses officially rated 150+ would have to be 160+ in reality – and that’s rarely the case. Hence the poor record of 150+ rated horses in handicap chase events at the Festival. And hence the similar poor record of handicap hurdle horses rated 150+.
Of the 50-handicap hurdle races we’re looking at, just 3 were won by horses rated 150+....
41 of our 50 races were won by horses officially rated 130 to 146. That band – encompassing just over a stone in the weights – appears to be the most fertile soil in which to look for handicap hurdle horses this time round. Those horses are rated high-enough to get a run – but low enough to have something in hand. That’s where I’d be looking....
The statistical record suggests you can discount older horses without too many concerns. They win handicap hurdle events occasionally – no stat is completely fool-proof – but it is the exception rather than the rule. 45 of the last 50 handicap hurdle winners at the Festival were aged between 5- and 8-years-old….
Avoid too much experience. Also, steer clear of horses with too little experience – 42 of the last 50 handicap hurdle winners had raced at least 3 times over timber but no more than 14 times….
44 of our 50 winners had been off-the-track and rested for at least 20 days. A longer break is no bar to winning. 30 of our winners – more than 50% – had been off the track for 5-weeks and longer....
Willie Mullins is the man with the best record of winning Festival handicap hurdle events with horses off a 5-week+ break – he’d saddled 6 such winners at the meeting over the last 13-years....
Headgear is something a trainer can reach for to improve a horse – to squeeze a bit more out. But be aware he can also be reaching for it in desperation....
First-time headgear hasn’t been a great guide to winners in handicap hurdle events since 2007. Just 2 such races were won by a horse wearing something for the first-time….
Claimers have a better record in Festival handicaps run over hurdles than they do in the handicaps run over fences. Eleven of our 50 winners had an apprentice up....
Seven of those winners were saddled by just 3 trainers – Nicky Henderson, David Pipe and Willie Mullins. If they put a claimer on one this time round, it is worth a look....
Henderson and Pipe put plenty up and sorting the wheat from the chaff is the challenge. Mullins has the best record – 3 winners from just 13 goes with another 3 placing – making any claimer he puts up this time round very interesting indeed....
Three yards have dominated the handicap hurdle events over the last decade….
Willie Mullins has produced 8 winners and 18 placers from 86 runners. That’s a cracking effort in a series of races with fields of 20+ runners going to post....
Paul Nicholls has produced 5 winners and 14 placers from 70 runners….
Nicky Henderson has produced 5 winners and 15 placers from 107 runners….
Gordon Elliott cannot be ignored either. He’s a relative new kid on the block compared to these gnarled veterans. As such he’s had fewer representatives in these races over the last 13-years – just 56....
But he’s already bagged 6 winners and 16 places – a performance suggesting he too can be a dominant force in these races going forward....
He certainly deserves to be included in your shortlist of trainers whose runners are worthy of close inspection….
Nor can Dan Skelton be overlooked with 3 winners from just 19 qualifying runners to date....
That’s all from me for today....
If you have any comments to add, insights to share or you just want to get something off your chest, do that here ....
I’ll be back tomorrow with more handicap-focused insight and analysis....
We’ll be looking at something very different from what anybody else is looking at – an information edge if you will....
In the meantime, go here to find out what you probably shouldn’t do when you’re unhappy with your bookie (at least not when there are witnesses on the plot)....
That’s all from me for now....
Until next time. Stay tuned.
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