Tuesday, 8th September 2020
Wednesday is Day 1 of Doncaster’s St Leger meeting….
There will be handicaps to target for value prices throughout the week. I’ll have money down on all qualifying events with a suitable field….
Potential targets this week and beyond….
Tomorrow the main focus of my interest is the 3.45 – the Each Way Extra At bet365 Handicap for horses aged 3yo+ and rated 0 to 105 over the 10f trip….
We’ll get to that. There’s no rush. In the meantime, there’s other business to report on….
There was a good C2 handicap for fillies over 6f at Salisbury last Thursday – won by Clive Cox’s Star In The Making at a big 16s….
The main body of market money was on Andrew Balding’s Chil Chil – up 9lbs for a win at Ascot the previous time and with champion jockey (current and elect) Oisin Murphy in the plate….
She got beaten – finishing 5th of the 12 runners and some 2.5 lengths in arrears at the post….
The usual bitter recriminations swiftly took hold on social media and in the racing forums – with poor old W B Yeats-reading Oisin Murphy branded a pig to a dog and back again….
I must admit that I do enjoy the spectacle of short-priced punters gnashing their teeth and foaming at the mouth when another sure thing goes down….
Self-professed 16-stone riding experts neurotically screeching for jockeys to be hung or burnt really does draw the old belly laugh out of me. Perhaps, I have a warped sense of humour….
Perhaps Oisin Murphy does too. In common with other weighing room inhabitants, Murphy is always swift to ‘like’ such comments on Twitter….
My advice is to keep Chil Chil in mind as the season progresses. She can go in again off a mark of 94….
I am absolutely certain it wasn’t the 9lb hike that got her beat but the soft ground at the track on the day….
I wouldn’t say conclusively that she can’t handle dig or won’t handle it in the future – she might have to handle soft or heavy if she is aimed at one of the sprints at Ayr. But last week, I reckon the softer surface caught her out….
She was slow to get going from the stalls. She then took a fierce hold. And I don’t think she quite got the level of cover she required in the first half of the race….
None of that helped. Even so, she did still make an eye-catching move late on that encourages the view the ground wasn’t entirely wrong for her. There simply wasn’t sufficient fuel left in the tank when it mattered, and her run petered out.…
On better ground, I reckon she would have been closer. The bottom line is this: I reckon she can win off her current rating….
As part of the ATC service, I like to bring you information, insights, and observations that you probably won’t be aware of….
And you probably won’t be aware of the fact that David Simcock’s C2 handicap runners are well worth the onceover at the St Leger meeting. The man’s got form, so to speak….
He’s produced a winning C2 handicapper at 7 of the last 8 St Leger meetings. His overall record reads as follows….
Something happening before is not a guarantee that it will happen again. But regular success suggests Simcock targets this week’s C2 handicap races and his qualifying runners this week are well worth a few moments of your attention….
You might take the view that stats are a nonsense. Or that Simcock has somehow got lucky. But in my experience racing doesn’t work like that….
You might get a bit of good luck. Just as you might get a bit of bad. But Simcock has twice the number of C2 handicap winners at the meeting over the last decade than all but one other yard. He is either extremely lucky – or there is an element of design, intention, and targeting behind the results….
The table below highlights the other yards with decent performance records in the C2 handicaps run at this week’s meeting….
Tomorrow’s 3.45 at Doncaster is one of those races you might easily swerve if you were so inclined – with half the 14-runner field trading at 8s or shorter….
I thought about sitting it out but ultimately decided the 7s about Jedd O’Keeffe’s STRAIT OF HORMUZ is just about acceptable in a race where several of the bigger-priced horses (and one or two of the shorter ones) are easy to put a line through….
O’Keeffe’s 3yo is one of the few genuinely progressive types in the race. He’s only raced at this trip once – last time at Chester. He was just denied that day by one of Andrew Balding’s and finished off like a horse that might well improve again for a crack at the same trip at tomorrow’s more conventional track – with the longer finishing straight….
Andrea Atzeni rides the horse for the first time. I think it’s the first time he’s ridden for the trainer too. I’m not concerned about that though. You could find a lot worse spares to do the 8-04 on the horse….
Nick’s contrarian picks….To recap on where my idea of the value lies tomorrow afternoon…. In the Each Way Extra At bet365 Handicap (3.45 @ Doncaster).
That is my take on where the value lies – but you will no doubt have your own ideas and that’s exactly as it should be. |
That’s all from me for now....
I’ll be back tomorrow with more handicap-focused insight, analysis, and intelligence.
Stay tuned....
P.S. One more thing: the feature event at Doncaster for handicap fans is Saturday’s Portland. If you missed my field-splitting pointers, catch-up here….
Operated by Spa Publishing Group Ltd (Company No. 15830286) 
