Tuesday, 7th June 2022
This time next week we’ll be anticipating Day 1 of Royal Ascot….
For me, it’s the dozen handicap races that take centre stage. Huge fields competing for big prize money produce ultra-competitive races and markets right up my street – where ‘live’ horses trade at big prices....
My mission is to isolate and back those horses. I won’t play in all 12 handicaps next week. But I’ll certainly play all the major ones….
Yesterday, I worked on the Wokingham. Today, it’s the Royal Hunt Cup. First – a horse that might be ready to strike….
David O’Meara’s Orbaan is on a winless streak stretching back 20 runs – but his time in the sun might well be approaching and the 7yo is worth keeping on your radar in the weeks ahead….
This time last year he was rated 102. On Friday he ran at Epsom off 87 in the Cazoo Derby Festival Handicap over 7f off just 87 – his lowest ever career mark….
And he produced a performance – 3rd of 15 and beaten 2.25 lengths – that suggests he is not too far away from landing a pot….
You can never be entirely sure about these things. And it wouldn’t be the first time he’s run a good race but subsequently failed to build on it….
But if he’s ever going to be sufficiently well-handicapped to snag some winning prize money in Britain – he’s bagged precious little since arriving at O’Meara’s yard from France – then you’d think a mark in the 80s will help him turn the key….
York has produced his best efforts to date and he’s entered in a race thereon Friday – where he’d be dropping back to C3 level….
He’s not had too many goes in that lower grade. And lesser opposition might just be wat he needs to get his head in front….
The Royal Hunt Cup (run on Day 2)is a C2 event for horses aged 3yo+ up the straight mile. Winning connections take home £94.5k….
A massive field always goes to post. 23+ started each of the last 20 renewals....
Just a single horse has manged to justify favouritism in the race over the last 20 years – but an additional 6 winners were sent off 2nd or 3rd in the betting....
14 of the 20 winners were sent off at double-figure SPs – so there’s plenty of encouragement for price-hunting punters….
44 of the 80 placers (I include 5th place on account of field-size) were sent off 16s or bigger....
The average winning SP amounts to 16s....
There are a couple of interesting points to note ahead of rooting out selections....
This is one of the biggest, most prestigious, and most fiercely contested handicaps on the programme – and one of the few big British handicaps where winners officially rated 100+ are commonplace....
Eleven of the last 20 editions were won by such horses. That said no horse rated higher than 105 has won during that period....
The field is so big the runners are spread out across the entire width of the track. Where the pace unfolds is key to the outcome. But where you start is important too….
Since 2011 – when stall numbers at right-handed tracks were revised – 6 of the 11 winners exited stall 21 or higher….
Just 3 winners started from a single-figure stall – and just 3 of the 33 horses that finished 2nd, 3rd, or 4th....
We get a more nuanced picture of the effects of the draw when we look at the percentage of opponents beaten by horses starting from the bottom third, the mid-third and the high-third of the draw….
The majority of winners came from the high-third – as stated above. But the table above reveals that horses in the middle-third perform best in terms of overall % of opponents beaten – and they might be undervalued by a market largely unaware of that fact….
The table below shows individual stall records – with the top-10 performing stalls shaded….
If you were looking for the most significant section of the draw, the cluster of stalls from 18 to 26 (where just a single stall registers a %btn figure below 50%) must be of interest….
The last 99 starters from that cluster produced 4 winners, 17 places and additional 5 horses that finished 6th. ‘Live’ horses drawn in that cluster might just have something going for them.…
Note: If you’d like a copy of the Excel file with the individual stalls listed in order of % of opponents beaten (a little too long a list for the column), drop me a line at the email address below….
As an aside, Silvestre De Sousa has ridden 7 horses in the race from that key cluster of stalls. None won – but he placed on 3 sent off at 33s, 25s & 50s. Keep an eye on where his horse is set to start from this year….
The Royal Hunt Cup is no place for a horse to ease into a longer trip. 18 of the last 20 winners had already won at a mile or further....
17 of the last 20 winners were aged either 4- or 5-years-old. So too were 62 of the 80 placers. There will be no shortage of horses in that age-band going to post. But it’s the area to look most closely in....
In ultra-competitive races like this, match-fitness is an obvious edge. Results bear the assumption out. Only 5 of the last 20 winners had been off the track more than 8-weeks. Just 2 had been off for a three-figure number of days....
There hasn’t been a single 3yo participant over the test-period and horses older than 5 have produced just 3 winners and 18 placers from 175 runners....
If you buy into the idea of individual yards possessing the knack in specific big races, there are three names to be aware of....
John Gosden’s yard produced 2 winners and 3 placers from its last 19 runners with one horse finishing 6th and 3 more horses finishing 7th – no bad return in a race with 27+ runners going to post most years….
James Fanshawe hasn’t managed to find a proper Royal Hunt Cup horse in recent years. But his overall record across the test period reads 2 winners and 3 placers from 8 representatives. If he has one in the race this time, it is worth a detailed inspection....
Jamie Osborne’s last 11 runners produced one winner, 3 places and another two that finished 6th and 7th. That’s some record....
There’s plenty to be noting down or thinking about there....
I’ll be back tomorrow with more. In the meantime….
Got an opinion? Something on your mind? Want to share? Contact me at: nick.pullen@oxonpress.co.uk
Stay tuned....
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