My Simple Ratings Method, Part 3

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This is the third article connected with my attempt at creating simple ratings for certain horse races, writes Dave Renham. The first piece looked at how you could create a simple ratings method; the second tested this simple idea using some historical results. As the results were quite promising, I thought I would extend the number crunching to more past races, and in this third article I will report back my new findings.

To give some context, I was looking for a method for rating handicap races and, as far as weighting was concerned, I decided to give each factor a similar one. In order to do this I used the PRB (Percentage of Rivals Beaten) metric.

The rating method I came up with involved five factors or variables – these were:

  1. Draw – splitting the draw into thirds;
  2. Most Recent form – for this factor I used last time out (LTO) finishing position;
  3. Recent Market data – LTO price was used for this one – so the Industry Starting Price the horse was returned in its most recent race;
  4. Long term form – for long term form I used career placed percentages in handicap races.
  5. Fitness –I used days since last run to create the PRB figures for this final variable.

For more ‘meat on the bones’, the first article explains in depth what the individual PRB values were within each of the above categories. Here's the link.

Essentially each horse ends up with five PRB values and therefore when rating a race, we simply add up the five PRB figures for each horse giving them a final total or rating score. The horse with the highest total becomes top rated, the second highest total becomes second rated and so on.

In the second article I did some back testing on the ratings, although for this stat-busting exercise I decided to ignore the draw factor by focusing on longer distance races. ‘Time’ was the main reason for ignoring the draw – it was something that was going to take far too long to collate the necessary information. Hence my ratings were ‘trimmed’ – now they would be created by using the four other PRB figures produced from LTO position, LTO price, career handicap placed percentages and days since last run.

I back tested 324 races with the following rules:

  1. Year - 2018 (UK racing)
  2. Age group - 3yo+ / 4yo+ handicaps
  3. Distance - 1m1f or longer
  4. Runners – 8 or 9

The results showed promise, and you can look at the in depth findings here.

For this next batch of testing, I kept the first three rules mentioned above, but changed the runners rule to 10 to 12 runner races. Before sharing the results of this second phase of testing, let me quickly share my thoughts on what I perceive to be the most important finding. For any ratings to have the ‘potential’ to be useful, they need to show strong similarities with the actual betting market. The first phase of testing did see this happening. For example, the top rated runner started favourite in over 41% of the races rated. Just 3.7% of top rated runners started 7th, 8th or 9th in the betting. Ultimately if your ratings do not mirror the betting market that well, then the chances are they are going to be dud.

Of course, as punters, we are looking for value, and the hope is also that the ratings throw up value selections. The first set of results shared in the second article offered some promise in that regard.

OK, it is time to look in detail at the 10 to 12 runner 2018 results. For the record this comprised of 362 races in total.

Firstly, let's review how the top rated horses matched up against the actual betting market.

 

 

This graph perfectly shows the type of sliding scale one wishes to see. It is similar to the one we saw when analysing the 8 to 9 runner race data.

Over 35% of the top rated runners started as the favourite, while more than 72% of the top rated runners started in the top three in the betting. Compare this to 8th or bigger in the betting which accounted for just 5.1% of all top rated runners.

Let's now look at the second top rated runners next in the same way:

 

 

Again, this graph gives the type of results that suggest the ratings are fairly accurate in terms of assessing potential chance of winning. We would expect the highest bars in the graph to be on the left hand side once more with a sliding scale going from left to right. 57.2% of the 2nd rated runners ended up in the top three of the betting compared with 2.3% ending up in the bottom three of the betting (10th or worse).

So once again the top section of the ratings are looking good. Time to take a look at the lowest rated to see how they fit against the market. Firstly let us look at the market rank percentages for the lowest rated runners. To begin with let's review the 12th rated runner in 12 runner handicap races:

 

 

This graph is effectively a mirror image of the first two we saw, which is exactly what I would hope to see. Over 66% of the bottom rated runners ended up 10th or lower in the betting.

Now a look at the 11 runner races (bottom rated):

 

 

An even better set of figures here in terms of correlation. This is probably due to the fact that the 11 runner sample size was around 33% bigger than for 12 runner races.

I don’t see the need to show the whole graph for the 10 runner races as well, but the results were similar once more. The bottom rated runner appeared 8th, 9th or 10th in the betting market over 63% of time, while only 12% of them ended up in the top three market positions.

It is very pleasing to see that the results we got for 8 to 9 runner races are being replicated here. Essentially these simple PRB based ratings are looking like providing a relatively sound framework in terms of forming our own market – if nothing else. I discussed some ideas about how to form a betting tissue/market in this article which preceded this series. These ratings could be used in conjunction with that – or even be used in a stand-alone manner.

Time to see how the ratings fared in terms of winning – their win strike rate. In the 8 to 9 runner results, the higher rated runners comfortably out-performed the lower rated ones. Obviously, I'm hoping for the same scenario here:

 

 

These results are reasonably positive – the top rated runner has done extremely well and we do get the type of sliding scale one would hope for. In truth, the 8 to 9 runner data looked stronger, but when you analyse win and placed data, the picture looks more clear-cut:

 

 

This graph gives excellent correlation with higher rated runners hitting higher win and placed strike rates; lower rated runners doing the reverse.

It is time now to look at the performance of the individual rating positions in terms of profit/loss to BSP. At this point it should be noted that in the whole data set for this article, there have been some unusually big-priced winners. The ten highest BSP prices of winners during this study were:

 

 

Within the type of sample size used for this piece, huge priced winners are a common problem when trying to use BSP as a value metric. That is why in other Geegeez articles, where appropriate, I have quoted BSP on shorter priced runners only. Unfortunately using this shorter priced idea will not work effectively on the rating positions data due to very small sample sizes (for the lower rated positions in particular). Therefore, in this case, the BSP profit/loss figures for individual ratings positions shown below may confuse matters for some readers, but hopefully you'll still get the gist at least:

 

 

We do have to take the profit/loss figures here with a pinch of salt however; especially the lower rated ones. Ordinarily strike rates of 4.1% and 5.2% are not going to produce stunning returns of 78.6 pence in the £ or 57.2 pence in the £.

Thus, instead of dwelling on these skewed figures, it makes more sense to dig deeper into the top-rated runner results as these prices as a whole are much shorter. In fact 88% of all top rated runners were priced 12.0 BSP shorter.

I want to look at two main areas when it comes to top-rated runners. Firstly I want to delve into profit / returns, so here are the profit/loss stats for top-rated runners in terms of their market position.

 

 

It is interesting to see that the top-rated runner has made a decent looking profit when actually starting as the favourite. From a ratings value perspective though, I would have liked to have seen slightly better figures from the poorer market positions. Having said that, 362 races is too small a sample to see a potential pattern emerge such as that, especially when just 63 top rated runners started 5th or higher in the actual betting market. It is heartening to know that top rated runners that were 5th or bigger in the betting did make a profit of £11.15 from these 63 runners, but we need much more data. Not just on top rated runners but on other rating positions too.

Secondly, I wanted a breakdown of how far clear of the 2nd rated the top rated was. This is something that I omitted to think about when penning the last article. Hence for this next table I have combined the relevant stats from both articles to include all 8 to 12 runner handicap results. This gives us a bigger data set for analysing the gap between the top two rated runners. Here are the findings:

 

 

Before commenting on this, it must be stressed that despite expanding the sample size, it is still a relatively modest one. However, one could not have dreamed of a much better set of results (well, I suppose I could have, but you have to have some sense of realism!) The bigger the gap, the better the results – both from a strike rate and returns perspective.

My next port of call was looking at ratings position versus betting market position. I wanted to compare the performance of horses that are rated better than their odds position, compared to those who are not. Here are the results:

 

 

As with the 8 to 9 runner data, horses ranked better than their price ranking have done best from a profit/loss perspective. There is a big differential here, but as I have already stated, the BSP data for all these races is not too reliable, and hence I would not read too much into this.

Before finishing, I have one more set of figures I want to share. As I did in the previous piece, I want to look at the actual rating scores and group the lower rated runners as a whole, and compare them with the higher rated runners. Tthe lowest possible rating using my PRB scores is 1.64; the highest possible is 2.39. The groupings I have used are horses that were rated 1.64 to 1.84, and horses that were rated 2.18 to 2.39. These are exactly the same groupings I used in the 8 to 9 runner article. Here is the comparison of wins, runs and strike rate for our two groups in 10 to 12 runner handicaps:

 

 

These stats are what one would have expected based on all the previous data shared in this article. However, it is always nice to have expectation validated in black and white.

I have not added the BSP profit figures as the 1.64 to 1.84 group had two of those huge priced winners I alluded to before (353.78 and 137.3). Such winners totally skew the profit/loss column making a comparison a mockery (as we have seen twice before in this piece, with the profit/loss figures for individual ratings positions, and with the rating rank v market rank BSP comparison). For the record, the 2.18 to 2.39 group, which did not have big priced winners skewing the results, lost a modest 20 points to BSP equating to an ROI of -4.7%.

So that’s currently where I’m at. There has definitely been further promise in this latest piece of research. I will decide where I go next with this over the next few days and any new ratings research will be written up and shared with you in the very near future.

- DR

My Simple Ratings Method Revisited

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In the last piece I wrote on Geegeez I attempted to demonstrate to readers how you could go about creating a rating method in order to help you to analyse a race, writes Dave Renham. This article continues on from that simple ratings method, as I have decided to dig into the past and do some testing using historical results.

To recap, I was looking for a method for rating handicap races and, as far as weighting was concerned, I decided to give each factor a similar emphasis. In order to do this I used the PRB (Percentage of Rivals Beaten) metric.

The rating method I came up with involved five factors, as follows:

  1. Draw – Using the Draw Analyser tool rather the draw tab in the racecard in order to define a more precise date range, I set what I felt were relevant parameters. These parameters had to ideally a) match the race in question; and b) give me a big enough sample size.

My ideal date range is a recent one such as 2016 to 2023, for handicaps only and, in terms of runners, covering a spread of plus or minus two runners compared with the field size of the race I was rating. So, for example, if it was a 10-runner race, I would set 8 to 12 runners on the Draw Analyser. The Draw Analyser gives PRB figures for individual stalls as well as grouping them into thirds. I used the thirds method for the ratings, grouping low draws together, middle draws together and high draws together.

  1. Most Recent form – for this factor I used last time out (LTO) finishing position. For the relevant PRB figures I looked at two full years of handicap race data (2021 and 2022) to give what should be incredibly accurate readings. This amounted to several thousand races. The PRB figures had a range from 0.60 for winners last time out to 0.41 for horses that finished 9th or worse LTO.
  2. Recent Market data – for this factor I used LTO price – so the Industry Starting Price the horse returned in its most recent race. Once again I used 2021 and 2022 handicap races to create these PRB figures. The PRB figures had a range from 0.60 for horses priced 6/4 or shorter LTO to 0.36 for horses that priced 40/1 or bigger LTO.
  3. Long term form – for long term form I used career placed percentages in handicap races. Again the data for the PRB figures was taken from the two years of 2021-22 handicap results. The PRB had a range from 0.58 for career placed percentages of 51% or more, down to 0.44 for those who hit 20% or less.
  4. Fitness – for this final factor I used days since last run to create the PRB figures. To give the most accurate scores I used the same data set (’21-’22 handicap races) as I had done for the previous factors. The PRB figures ranged from 0.61 for horses that returned to the track within three days to 0.43 for horses off the track for 71 or more days.

So, essentially when rating each race, I took the relevant five PRB figures for each horse and added them up. The horse with the highest total became top rated, the second highest total became second rated and so on.

After writing the original article my plan was to rate a few races and see how the figures worked out. This is something I am still in the process of doing and will feed back my findings in a future article.

[I initially had no intention of back testing results because I thought it would take far too long. However, using a bit of excel, a fair amount of copying / pasting, and a few shortcuts I thought of as I was going along, I managed to get a year’s worth of ratings data in a few hours. The only ‘problem’ is that to do this I had to ignore the draw factor. The main reason for this was that it would take me far too long to gather the draw data (probably several months). But there were other reasons as well, one being that a good proportion of course and distances do not have a significant draw bias so trawling through masses of these types of race would not really improve the ratings or make them more accurate.]

So my ratings would be created using the four other PRB figures based on LTO position, LTO price, career handicap placed percentages and days since last run.

When you create ratings or systems and then back test them on past results, it is important to ensure that you use a different data set. This is a common mistake people make – one I made the first time I tried to create systems back in the early 90s. Hence, having used a data set of 2021 to 2022 to create all the PRB figures, I needed to choose a different year for the testing phase. I chose 2018.

A year of handicaps gives me plenty of data to work with. I did however want to narrow that down by looking only at 3yo+ and 4yo+ handicaps, as this would avoid handicaps with younger, less exposed runners. My assumption is that these ratings will work far better in races that involve older horses. I also chose to try and eliminate any draw factors by choosing handicaps races of 1 mile 1 furlong or more. Without the draw in the ratings, it made no sense to test shorter distance handicaps where draw bias can be extremely relevant and potential skew some ratings results (without the draw PRB being considered). Finally, I looked at 8- or 9-runner 3yo+/4yo+ handicap races for the basis of this article.

Just to reiterate I am back testing my ratings on:

  1. Year - 2018 (UK racing)
  2. Age group - 3yo+ / 4yo+ handicaps
  3. Distance - 1m1f or longer
  4. Runners – 8 or 9

Before sharing the results of my testing, let me discuss briefly what I am hoping to find. For the ratings to have the potential to be useful/effective, more often than not, they need to show strong correlation with the actual betting market. If your top two rated horses are consistently near the head of the actual betting market this is a far more positive sign than if they are consistently near the foot of the betting market. Of course in terms of making a profit from your ratings, you are looking for them to be more accurate than the actual betting market and throw up value selections. Not easy!

OK, let’s dig into my findings:

Firstly let's see how the top rated horses matched up against the actual betting market.

 

 

This graph is extremely positive with over 41% of the top rated runners starting as the favourite. Indeed 79% of the top rated runners started in the top three in the betting. There is a definite sliding scale, too, showing the type of correlation you would be hoping for. Let me look at the second top rated runners next in the same way:

 

 

Again, this graph gives positive results. You would expect the higher bars in the graph to be on the left hand side once more, and they are. Just over 72% of the 2nd rated runners ended up in the top four of the betting.

So the top section of the ratings are looking good. How about the lowest rated? Firstly let us look at the market rank percentages for the lowest rated runners. To begin with let me look at the 8th rated runner in 8-runner handicap races:

 

 

The graph is reversed compared with the first two we saw, which is exactly what we are looking for. 44% of the lowest rated runners were at the bottom of the betting market in 8th place. Less than 17% of them ended up in the top four of the betting. Further positive news as far as the ratings are concerned.

Now a look at the 9-runner races (bottom rated):

 

 

A similar lay out to the 8-runner races with nearly 72% of 9th rated runners ending up 7th, 8th or 9th in the actual betting market.

I have to say that I am extremely pleased with the correlation to date between my ratings and the betting market. For something that is relatively simple (just four parameters), it is mirroring the betting market well.

So these ratings, on the evidence we have so far (based on 324 races), definitely show some potential. Time to see how the ratings fared in terms of winning – their win strike rate. Clearly I was hoping that the top rated runners would comfortably out-perform lower rated ones. Here are the findings:

 

 

More positive news with the top two rated runners both securing strike rates in excess of 20%. Also a clear break between the top four rated and those rated fifth to ninth. The 7th rated is very slightly out of kilter, but this can happen – the important fact is the trend from top rated to bottom rated is downwards.

What I now want to look at is how the ratings would have performed if betting on them. I am assuming that we are backing at £1 level stakes to Betfair Starting Price (BSP). Here are the findings:

 

 

The results for the top rated runner are a little disappointing, losses of around 17p in the £. Horses ranked 7th have made surprisingly high profits, but most of the big priced BSP winners happened to pop up in this specific ranking position. I doubt these figures would be replicated again – this is just the type of outlier you can get when analysing BSP profit/loss.

When taking the top four rated as a whole, they have outperformed horses rated fifth to ninth as the table below shows:

 

 

Considering how big priced runners on Betfair can skew the figures, these grouped results are very heartening.

I must admit I am pleasantly surprised with these initial findings. I am intrigued to see how the ratings work with shorter distance races where I can include the fifth parameter – draw bias.

My next port of call was looking at ratings position versus betting market position. I wanted to compare the performance of horses that are rated better than their odds position, compared to those who are not.

Just to clarify, some examples of horses that are rated better than their odds position would be as follows (I appreciate for many I am just stating the obvious, but just in case there is any confusion in my English/grammar):

 

 

And here are examples where they are not (these include identical positions in the rank of the ratings compared to the actual market rank):

 

 

My hope is that I see better returns for horses that are rated better than their odds position, compared to those who are not. This would suggest that the ratings can potentially pinpoint some value selections.

Here are the returns for each:

 

These figures suggest the rankings are doing a pretty good job – it seems there has been more value when the rating rank has been better than the market position.

Before winding this piece up, I have one more set of data to share with you. I am looking at the actual rating scores and grouping the lower rated runners as a whole, and comparing them with the higher rated runners. Now the lowest possible rating using my PRB scores is 1.64; the highest possible is 2.39. The groupings I have used are horses that were rated 1.64 to 1.84, and horses that were rated 2.18 to 2.39. These groupings from 2018 3yo+/4yo+ handicaps would have produced the following results:

 

 

The strike rates should come as no surprise based on the evidence of the ‘Ratings Win SR%’ graph shown earlier, but the differences in returns are even wider than I had expected. It is another indication that these simple ratings have some real potential.

I'm to park things here for now and start further number crunching for the follow up article. The data set of 324 races is a decent one, but before making too many bold claims, I think we need to look to how these ratings fare in other races. Research wise, I plan to analyse the 2018 data from 10- to 12-runner races next. Once that’s done, I will write it up and share my findings.

Stay tuned!

- DR

How To Create Simple Horse Racing Ratings: Example

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In my previous article I went through some basic ideas in terms of trying to create your own odds line or betting tissue, writes Dave Renham. In this piece I am going to show you how to go about trying to create a rating method in order to help you when analysing a race. There is no perfect way to rate a race; there are no perfect ratings, so this idea / method I am sharing is just one of thousands of potential ways to rate a horse race.

Two problems in the past I have found with rating a race have been firstly which factors to use, and secondly what ‘weighting’ or importance do I give to each one. Let’s look at factors first:

Factors / variables to use – to start with, one important thing to be aware of is to make sure the factors you ‘rate’ do not overlap in any way. A simple example of this would be using ‘last time out (LTO) finishing position’ but using ‘LTO beaten distance’ as well. These two factors are very similar as they are both measuring last time out performance and they should not be used in combination in terms of rating races; rather, choose one or the other.

For me I do not want to over complicate things so I would be looking for a handful of factors/variables to use in my ratings. Here are the factors I tend to concentrate on when trying to develop a rating system, and what ‘measure’ I would use:

  1. Most Recent form – either LTO finishing position or LTO distance beaten
  2. Recent market data – LTO price or prices from last 2-3 runs
  3. Long term form – some stat connected with the horses’ overall career
  4. Fitness – days since their last race
  5. Draw – past C&D draw stats split into thirds

Weighting of factors/variables – this is tricky in my opinion, and I have no magic bullet to share with you I’m afraid. What I have struggled with in the past is which stats to use for each factor – win strike rate, placed strike rate, A/E indices, etc. Not only that, but how on earth do you ‘weight’, for example, LTO position versus days since last run? How do the individual LTO finishing positions compare with a grouping of days since the horse ran last? What grouping for days since last run do I use? I cannot use individual days, so do I group it in weeks, blocks of 10 days, etc?

There are lots of questions, but no clear cut answers. Suffice to say, you just have to go with your gut instinct in terms of weighting factors. Once you have rated a few races, you will get a feel for what you may have to adjust to improve them.

For this article I will be using the five variables mentioned above in an attempt to create simple ratings for horse races. As far as weighting is concerned, I am basically going to weight each factor in a similar way. In order to do this, my stat of choice is going to be the PRB stat (Percentage of Rivals Beaten).

Percentage of rivals beaten (PRB) – Before becoming a member of the Geegeez family I had not really delved into this metric much. However, now, I think it is arguably the most important racing stat I consider. For more information on PRB (and the other metrics used on geegeez.co.uk) check out this article.

On Geegeez you can find the PRB stat in a variety of areas which can be accessed from the racecard – individual horse records such as:

 

On the Profiler tab:

 

In the pace / run style tab:

 

And in the draw tab:

Hence, we can find the draw PRB stats needed for my simple rating method on Geegeez. For the remaining stats we need to make use of several hours of number crunching I did prior to writing this article.

How is this simple rating system going to work?

Essentially, I am going to use the five factors mentioned earlier and find the relevant PRB figures for each horse within each factor. Then I am going to add up the five PRB scores to give me their final scores or rating. I said it was simple! I would suggest trying this idea in handicap races; I would use a different idea for say 2yo races or 3yo maiden races.

Right, let’s go through each factor one by one:

  1. Draw – I would like to start with one of the tabs you can use on Geegeez. Let us imagine we have a 1m handicap at Pontefract with 9 runners. I would actually go to the Draw Analyser tool rather the draw tab in the racecard in order to use a more precise date range. Hence this is what I would enter in terms of parameters:

 

 

As you can see, I have chosen a recent date range (2016 to 2023); handicaps only due to it being a handicap, 7 to 11 runners (+ or -2 from 9 runners), full ‘going’ range from hard to heavy, and ‘Actual’ rather than ‘Card’ as this takes non-runners into account.

In this imaginary 9-runner handicap example, any horse drawn 1 to 3 would get a ‘0.60’ PRB ‘rating’ figure, those drawn 4 to 6 would get ‘0.48’ and draws 7 to 9 the figure would be ‘0.42’.

  1. Most Recent form – for this factor I am going to use LTO finishing position. For the PRB figures I have looked at thousands of handicap races to give the most accurate readings. Here are the PRB figures for LTO finishing position:

 

 

As you can see LTO winners have a PRB figure of 0.60 when running in their next race; compare this with horses that finished 9th or worse LTO whose figure is much lower, not surprisingly, at just 0.41.

Therefore, when rating each horse you simply need to look for their LTO finishing position and assign the relevant figure from this graph.

  1. Recent Market data – for this factor I am going to use LTO price – so the price the horse was in its most recent race. Here are the PRB figures, again taken from thousands of races:

 

 

Another sliding scale here as you would expect with shorter priced runners LTO producing higher PRB figures. Hence a horse that was priced 11/2 LTO would be assigned a rating figure of 0.55, if they were priced 25/1 LTO their figure would be 0.44, etc.

  1. Long term form – for long term form I am going to use career placed percentages in handicap races. The data shared again is taken from thousands of races to give us the most accurate figures possible. I have split the percentages into four groups as the graph below shows:

 

 

The beauty of this stat from a Geegeez perspective is that you can find these percentages by using the ‘Instant Expert’ tab from the racecard. All you need to do is to adjust the distance tab (top left of screenshot) to include all races (I use the full range from 5f to 4m4f), click the handicap tab (top right of screenshot), and for ALL flat races click the ‘Flat & AW’.

 

 

In the above example, the horse at the top has a career placed percentage of 43% and as this lies between the ’36 to 50%’ grouping, this horse would be worth a PRB figure of 0.54.

  1. Fitness – for this metric I am using days since last run (DSLR) with once more thousands of races analysed to create accurate PRB figures. Here are the splits:

 

 

As you can see this metric is going to be quite even for most horses, as the vast majority of runners will have been off the track for between 8 and 70 days. The 8 to 14, 15 to 28, 29 to 42 and 43 to 70 groupings are very close together in terms of PRB figures.

And that’s it for configuring my factors. Hopefully it has been fairly self-explanatory.

However, let me give you a fictitious example which hopefully will help. I will stick to the 9-runner mile handicap race at Pontefract that I used for the draw data earlier.

Firstly here are our imaginary horses and their relevant stats:

 

 

From here we can convert these into the relevant PRB figures for each individual stat:

 

 

I have totalled up the five PRB figures for each horse to give them a final total (furthest column on the right). These totals are their final rating figures and I have ordered our imaginary horses highest to lowest below:

 

 

From these ratings, you would hope there is good chance that the winner will come from one of the top three (Fireball, Frazzle and Dobbin); likewise you would hope the bottom three rated (Monty, The Closer and The Gooner) are unlikely to produce the winner.

How you deploy your ratings is going to be different for each individual. You may want to use them as a basis for an odds line – in a 9-runner race, each horse theoretically has an 8/1 chance of winning so you could initially price up the middle rated horse at 8/1. This horse is Plodder – from here you could assign the rest of the prices using Plodder as your starting point, and then adjust them to get a book percentage of close to 100%. Once done you could compare them to the actual prices on offer to see if there are any horses that potentially offer you value.

An alternative approach is to simply compare the actual market position with your rating positions. Let’s say for argument’s sake Dobbin, your third rated horse, is priced up at 10/1 and is 6th in the betting, you might perceive this to offer value. Likewise if the top rated horse Fireball is third in the betting priced 5/1, again you might perceive this horse to offer you some value.

Essentially how you interpret the ratings is going to be personal to you – again there is no right or wrong way. What ultimately matters is how predictive your ratings are. I have not back tested this rating idea as yet, but it is on my ‘to do list’, as I have enjoyed researching and writing this piece. What is likely with a first ratings attempt is that I will need to make some adjustments – for this idea it may be that I am underrating one particular factor and overrating another. If that proves to be the case, I could apply some multipliers to the relevant PRB figures to help with that adjustment. For example, I may need to multiply the underrated PRB figures by 1.10 and the overrated ones by 0.90 to give more accurate overall ratings. However, that is for another time.

Until next time, I’d encourage you to experiment for yourself and if you find anything interesting, feel free to share in the comments below.

  • DR

How to Create an Odds Line / ‘Tissue’

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In this article I am going to discuss some ideas when it comes to creating your own odds line (betting odds / tissue), writes Dave Renham. As punters we need to take the odds of horses into account when contemplating a bet so 'finding value' is clearly an area of real importance. I wonder, though, what percentage of punters actually produce their own odds lines? I would guess less than 1%.

The modern world seems all about trying to do things quickly, and most punters haven’t got the time or inclination to spend hours and hours creating an odds line or betting tissue for races. Although there is no magic bullet for creating a line, in this article I will look at three basic DIY methods for your consideration, none of which take too much time to produce.

Why create an odds line?

Before delving into some ideas, let me first talk a little about why you may want to create an odds line and why an accurate one is extremely useful.

Making money from horse racing is not about the ratio of winners to losers you get, it is about whether you are able to achieve value prices. If you can achieve value prices on most of your selections you WILL come out in front. I’ve lost count of the number of times friends who have gone to a race meeting, usually on a ‘jolly’, have asked me to give them as many winners as possible. My reply is always the same: ‘if you want the most number of winners, just bet the favourite’. I tell them that favourites are the most likely horse to win so bet them. Of course this is true – they have the best chance of winning in percentage terms. However, I do also tell them that this is not the right way to approach betting in reality and that I am simply answering their question with a percentage-based answer.

So let's explore what ‘value’ is in more detail. Sticking with favourites for the moment, let us imagine over a long period of time we back a hundred identical favourites who all theoretically have the same chance of winning, and are all priced at Even money. According to their betting odds, each horse has a 50% chance of winning their respective race. For you to achieve ‘value’ the true chance of each horse winning needs to in excess of 50%. In reality is more likely to be around 45%.

Let us now imagine that each horse has a true percentage chance of winning of 55%. Over the 100 races, you will win 55 and lose 45, and make a profit of 10p for every £1 bet.

It would be interesting to know how many punters have a good understanding of probability in terms of betting odds. I am lucky that my main profession was as a Maths teacher and hence probability is something I understand well.

I must admit, I am often amused when I hear about certain ‘significant’ market movers. For example you may hear a pundit say, ‘Horse A has halved in priced from 33/1 to 16/1’, which I think gives people the wrong impression. OK, if these two prices reflect the true chance of Horse A winning, then the probability of success has improved from 2.9% to 5.9%. Whilst it is technically correct that the horse has halved in price, the percentages have changed by just 3%, which is not as big a swing as the numbers 33 and 16 perhaps suggest.

Let us imagine another horse, Horse B, whose price has come in from 9/4 to 13/8. On first glance, for some, I would guess that this shortening in price does not appear anywhere near as big as the 33/1 to 16/1 one. However, this second example is actually a much bigger percentage swing, moving from a 30.8% chance of winning (9/4) to 38.1% (13/8) - a difference of 7.3%. So understanding the percentages when it comes to betting prices is important.

When to use a 'tissue'

Before I look at some different ideas regarding creating tissues, or odds lines, I want to suggest what type of races you might start with. I think it is best to look at races where most of the runners are 'exposed' – in other words, they have plenty of form in the book. I would probably avoid Group races and low grade handicaps, however, and look for something in between – maybe class 2, 3 or 4 handicaps. Also I would personally focus on races with smallish fields for the first few races – around 7 to 9 runners seems a sensible option - in order to manage the time aspect of creating a tissue. Ok, let’s look at method 1.

 

Method 1. The ABCD method

This is a very simplistic idea but is a potential starting point if trying this for the first time. I would grade each runner depending on what I felt in terms of their general chance of winning, where:

A – very strong chance

B – good chance

C – worth considering

D – unlikely, but cannot dismiss

E – poor chance

F – virtually no chance

How you assess each horse to arrive at your ranking is totally up to you. I personally would look at a combination of factors using some, or all, of the following:

i) form, both recent and long term

ii) fitness

iii) trainer/stable form – recent and course form

iv) the draw in flat races

v) potential run style if known

vi) starting prices of most recent starts

vii) speed ratings

 

Of course this is not a definitive list, there are other factors you may wish to consider; essentially it is up to you.

Having graded the horses I would then try and assign a rough percentage chance of them winning. Let us imagine a 7 runner race where we have the following grades:

 

 

From here I would add up all the percentages and here they total 103%. Ideally I would like them to add up to 100% to give me a ‘perfect’ book, but 103% is perfectly acceptable. If your percentages are further away from 100%, massage the 'percentage chance' figures until they fit.

From here I would assign the closest betting price to each percentage. Some percentages such as 25% have an exact betting price of 3/1; others, like 15%, have not, but the closest price to that is 11/2 (which equates to 15.4% chance). Here is my grid with the prices added and the percentage chance rounded:

 

 

The overall percentage book has edged up slightly to 103.9%, but this still pretty good.

From here I would simply look at the best prices available across all bookmakers, and/or check the Betfair market. The Betfair market and most odds comparison sites (including the geegeez cards 'odds' tab - see image) give you the book percentage for the race so you can see how close that is to your book percentage.

 

 

The book percentages should be similar to yours, within a few percentage points at least. Betfair Exchange will always have a figure closer to 100% than the best bookie prices.

If you prefer to work with odds and then convert those to percentages, the 'My Ratings' icon will enable you to do this. Click the icon in the menu bar to open the ratings boxes for all runners, and then simply add odds to each runner. You'll see the percentages calculated for you, both for the individual runner and for the race overall:

 

 

At this point you need to compare the actual prices on offer with your own prices. We are looking for the positive outliers - horses that are priced higher in the real betting market when comparing them with your prices. Let us imagine in our example above that Horse C is best priced with the bookies at 9/1 (10.0) which equates to a percentage chance of winning of 10%. This gives us an ‘edge’ of around 5% assuming that our price is accurate! If our price is an accurate representation of the true percentage chance of the horse in question, then we have a value bet.

 

Method 2. Simple Rating Method

The second idea I want to look at is a basic rating idea. Once more I’ll assume we have a 7 runner race with exposed horses. Look at each of the horses in the race and their finishing position last time out. I would then look at the long term data in relation to that finishing position when racing in similar 7 runner races. For example, last time out winners win roughly 22% of the time in these races, horses that finished 5th last time win around 12%, etc. From here I halve each percentage and assign that as a rating figure to each horse.

Then I would look at four or five different factors (such as those I shared earlier in the ABCD method above), giving each horse either a positive, neutral or negative mark. For positives I would add two points to their total, neutral marks I would leave the rating as it is, for negatives I would subtract two. One of these factors could be, for example, last time out starting price. If a horse started at 3/1 last time, say, this would count as a positive and gain a ‘+2’. If another horse started at 25/1 on its prior run then I would give that a ‘-2’.

Once you’ve done this across all factors / variables you will have ‘rating’ totals for each horse such as below:

 

 

From here you can add up the final rating totals which in this case equals 62. Then divide the rating for each horse by 62 and multiply by 100 to give them a percentage chance. In this example we get the following:

 

 

With the percentages of the seven horses adding up to 100% we have a perfect betting book. From here we would change these percentages into betting odds in the same way as before. If you are unsure how to convert percentages into odds, then there are odds calculators that you can google and use; or enter the odds into the geegeez ratings boxes like in the image above.

I personally use an excel sheet with a simple formula to calculate the individual horse percentage chances, and the sheet also calculates the percentage book for the race. It is not too difficult to set up and anybody interested please request in the comments below.

Once we have our odds, as previously, we would cross check our prices against the actual odds on offer looking for any horse that offers ‘value’.

 

Method 3. Using a ‘benchmark’ horse or horses

This is the method I used for these types of races when I was writing Spotlight for the Racing Post many moons ago. Interestingly, Andrew Mount, who co-wrote a draw bias book with me 20 years ago and also worked as a Spotlight writer for many years, used the same idea in certain races for more exposed runners.

The ‘benchmark’ horse is basically the horse which you think is the easiest to accurately price up / give a percentage chance of winning. Each race will of course be slightly different and hence each ‘benchmark’ horse is likely to fit a slightly different profile. The types of horses I’d be looking for are either:

  1. a horse that stands out on form – in other words the horse you believe should start favourite. The potential price of your favourite will depend on your perceived chance of the horse winning. If you thought the horse was likely to win this type of race one in every three starts you would price the horse at 2/1 (3.0); if you thought it was likely to win the race one in two you’d price it up at Evens (2.0), etc.
  2. a horse with a consistent recent record; hopefully one with solid form figures over the last three or four races. Ideally this horse would have gone off at similar prices too in these races. So if we say had a horse that had finished 4th, 2nd and 3rd in their last three runs, starting at prices of between 3-1 and 5-1, then you would probably could price the horse up at around the 4-1 mark.

Once you have a price for your ‘benchmark’ horse you can build the prices of other horses around it. Horses you think that have a better chance than your ‘benchmark’ will be put in at a shorter price, those with a worse chance in your opinion will be priced higher. You may find that two or more horses in a race have either profile 1 or 2 mentioned above, which will speed up the process slightly. Naturally, you can use the odds boxes behind the My Ratings icon on geegeez racecards to help you price up.

Once you have priced up the other horses around your ‘benchmark’ horse(s), then you will need to see what the percentage book for the race equals and it may need some slight adjustment of prices up or down. Once you have a book close to 100% then you can compare prices with the best prices on offer as we did for the previous two methods.

 

**

 

For those of you who have not attempted to create odds lines before, I hope these ideas make the task feel less daunting. Of course, using any of the three methods suggested does not mean you will be getting that much needed value race in, race out. It is going to essentially depend on how accurate your odds line is. The only way to find out how accurate it is, is by choosing a method, either one of the above, or a method of your own, and testing it out. One indication that you have a sound method is if your prices generally ‘mirror’ the actual market. If they don’t and, say, you price up horses at 2/1 that are regularly available at 5/1 in the real world, then you need to go back to square one and figure out why the disparity.

If the prices you create generally look reasonable compared to the actual prices on offer then I would suggest pinpointing those horses that look good value when comparing your odds with those of the bookmakers. Paper test these value selections with imaginary £1 stakes and see what happens over a series of ‘bets’. If you are in profit by the end of your testing phase then there are hopeful signs that your odds line is pretty accurate.

How many of these imaginary £1 bets you should work through during the testing phase is not easy to say, but I personally think you need to have at least 200 to give the test some validity. Of course, you could also look for horses that seem poor value and see how they performed as well. All of this will give you a decent overall picture of the effectiveness of your tissue making skills. Once you are happy with your method, then I would suggest looking at races with bigger fields but still races where the horses are exposed.

One final point to note is that I would look at a race as early as possible. With 48 hour declarations you can price up the race before the bookmakers and give yourself plenty of time. Also pricing it up early avoids you being influenced by early odds or the Racing Post forecast prices.

I would not advocate the same method for every single race – for example you cannot use any of the above ideas with a 2yo race with little or no form. Perhaps in the future I will revisit this topic and look at how you may try to create odds lines in other races such as these. For now, though, I hope this article has encouraged you to look into creating your own odds lines – even if you do not find the holy grail, the process you go through will, I am sure, be useful and enlightening for your overall betting / value understanding.

- DR

p.s. Here's the simple sheet I referred to: forecast odds overround calculator

You type in the odds (traditional) and the spreadsheet will calculate the percentage for each horse, the book percentage and the overround. As long as users take care to retain the formula in cell C2 then it is merely a case of deleting the column B odds and the column C percentages (cells C3 and below). Then, once you've typed in the new odds for your race you can simply copy and paste the formula in cell C2 down column C as far as you need to.

If you lose the formula in cell C2 just re-type =100/(B2+1) in to that cell. The total book percentage and overround will provide the relevant percentages for each race.

Run Style: When Early Leaders *Don’t* Have The Edge

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Regular readers of my Geegeez articles will know that probably my favourite area of horse racing research is connected with the run style of horses, writes Dave Renham. This is mainly due to the fact that at shorter distances early leaders/front runners tend to have an edge over horses which initially take up a prominent, mid-division, or held up position. Indeed, as I've observed before, this front running edge is extremely potent at a good number of course and distances. However, there are plenty of races where front runners do not have an edge, and hold up horses start to become much more competitive. In this article I am going to explore this area, and I will begin by digging into some general stats.

For this piece I will be looking at UK racing from 2015 to 2022 with the focus on 8+ runner handicaps.

General Hold Up Run Style Data

Let's start by looking at a graph comparing front runners with hold up horses across all the flat distances, looking firstly at win strike rate:

 

 

This graph illustrates neatly how the general advantage to front runners drops as the race distance increases. We do not really have to worry about different field size averages for different distances, because we are basically comparing the strike rates for one run style group against the other at each specific distance range. However, it should be noted that in any race there are almost always going to be more hold up horses than front runners. In a 12-runner race for example, we might expect to see one front runner, maybe two; but in terms of hold up horses we are likely to have three or perhaps four. This is something to keep in mind when comparing run style win percentages.

If we look at the A/E indices*, a measure of value, we see excellent correlation with the win SR% graph:
*You can read more about A/E here

 

 

 

In 8+ runner handicaps of 1m5f or more there is virtual parity in terms of betting value between front runners and hold up horses. Although just about equal, however, following either run style as a betting approach is a sure route to potlessness! Sticking with these longer races, there are some interesting findings when we break down results by going. Here are the win strike rates for front runners / hold up horses when comparing results on good or firmer ground with good to soft or softer:

 

 

As we can see the going on turf does seem to make a difference in 1m5f+ handicaps. On firmer ground there is a smaller difference between the records of both run style groups, when compared with data on softer ground. It seems harder to make up ground from the back on a softer surface.

If we look at the all-weather data for these longer races, we can see a different outcome from the turf:

 

 

Hold up horses actually have a better strike rate in longer handicap races on the synthetics with front runners struggling, winning less than 1 race in every 14. There is also a big difference between the all-weather A/E indices, with front runners standing on a lowly 0.61 figure (akin to punting suicide) and hold up horses at 0.86.

Let's now dig into some individual course data in terms of hold up horse performance. In the graph below we can see a comparison between courses that have the highest A/E indices for hold up horses versus those with the lowest. The top 10 course figures and the lowest 10 figures are shown – all distances have been combined:

 

 

There is a huge difference between the top figures and the bottom ones: Yarmouth heads the list with a highly credible A/E of 0.95 which is a world away from Ripon’s hideous 0.53 figure. The ‘returns’ for hold up horses at each of these courses mirror the A/E index chasm with Yarmouth hold up horses losing 18.7 pence in the £ at Starting Price, while Ripon hold ups lost a massive 53.7 pence in the £.

 

Course Specific Hold Up Run Style Data

We will look now at some specific track statistics concerning hold up horses, beginning at the Norfolk seaside.

Yarmouth 5f

Here are the win strike rates for each run style category over Yarmouth's 5f distance:

 

 

This is a highly unusual set of run style figures: the minimum trip at most flat tracks shows the highest positive edge to front-runners. Looking at the ALL courses data combined over five furlongs, front runners win 18.2% of races while hold up horses are down at 6.5%. But at Yarmouth we have the reverse with the strike rate for hold up horses being three times that of front runners.

In addition to the win stats, the A/E index for hold up horses over 5f at Yarmouth stands at an impressive 1.04. Sticking with A/E indices, at five of the eight distances run at Yarmouth hold up horses have secured a figure of above 1.00, suggesting the advantage to patiently ridden horses is underbet.

Newcastle 1m

I have always felt that the all-weather track at Newcastle is one where hold up horses are competitive due to the stamina-sapping nature of the configuration coupled with the uphill half mile finish in the straight. I am pleased to see the stats back this up. It should be noted that for Newcastle I am looking at data from 2016 onwards, when the course changed from a turf course to an all-weather one.

The distance where hold up horses do best at Newcastle is over 1 mile. This trip is the longest of the four distances on the straight course, and it clearly plays more to the strengths of hold up horses.

 

 

These strong figures for late runners are replicated when we look at the Percentage of Rivals Beaten (PRB) data:

 

 

The held up PRB figure of 0.55 is a strong one. Closers have actually made a blind profit to Industry SP despite there being nearly 1400 of them. Such runners have secured returns of just over 3p in the £. Compare this to the combined losses of the other three run style groups which stands a depressing 29p in the £.

Digging deeper into hold up horses over 1 mile at Newcastle, when they have started in the top three of the betting they have won 80 races from 360 (SR 22.2%) for an SP profit of £49.98 (ROI +13.9%). Hence, a well fancied hold up horse over this course and distance is definitely worth a second glance.

The longer distances of 1m4f and 2m at Newcastle see front runners having a really hard time of it winning under 6% of all races and backing all front runners would have yielded heavy losses of 54p in the £.

 

Doncaster 1m4f+

In races of 1m4f or more on Town Moor, hold up horses perform strongly as any group, while front runners have really found it hard going. Taking the data straight from the Geegeez Pace Query Tool we see the following:

 

 

There were just two wins from 92 runners for horses that took the early lead in such races between 2015 and 2022; and front runners as a group also had notably the poorest placed record. One plausible reason for these humbling figures, along with the fact that we are dealing with longer distances, is that the Doncaster straight is 4½ furlongs in length. I am a believer that longer straights as a rule tend to be harder for front runners to maintain their advantage when compared to tracks with shorter straights.

Over 5f at Doncaster front runners also had a hard time of it, winning just twice from 54 runs. Hold up horses at that trip edged it over the other three run styles winning just shy of 10% of the time (A/E 0.98).

 

Ascot 1m

1 mile handicaps at Ascot are often extremely competitive and, from a run style perspective, hold up horses do best. Here are the splits:

 

 

These are highly noteworthy figures for hold up horses considering the stats for ALL courses combined over 1 mile (8+ runner handicaps) sees front runners winning 12.8% of the time and hold up horses just 7.6% of the time.

The PRB figures are also very strong for hold up horses as the graph below shows:

 

 

Backing these 2015-2022 data up, both the Royal Hunt Cup (22/1 Jimi Hendrix) and the Britannia Handicap (6/1 Docklands) were won by hold up horses at the recent Royal Ascot meeting.

 

*

 

Earlier I looked at some data for all courses across all distances. Having looked at a few specific course and distances, I want to now share data for more courses at two different distance ranges.

 

Run Style Negatives: Front runners in handicaps of 1m4f+

At the beginning of the article when looking at long distance races I used 1m5f or more as my cut off point. However, in order to get better and bigger data sets when looking at individual courses (rather than ALL courses), we need to include races of 1m4f or more.

Below are the courses where front runners have the lowest win strike rates at distances of 1m4f+ – the ten lowest in fact (at least 45 races during the study period):

 

 

Doncaster and Newcastle, which we have previously discussed, top the list. It is also no surprise to see four of the six all-weather courses in this table considering what we found earlier with the overall 1m5f+ AW data.

Here now are those courses with the lowest A/E indices:

 

This table correlates well with the first one, eight of the ten tracks appearing on both lists – Doncaster, Goodwood, Newcastle, Brighton, Chelmsford, Ayr, Wolverhampton and Kempton.

It is clear that if we are ‘sweet’ on a front runner at any of these courses in handicaps races of 1m4f or more, we need to be really sweet! The stats are truly against us.

 

Run Style Negatives: Front runners in handicaps of 1m 1f to 1m3f

My final port of call in this piece is 8+ runner handicaps incorporating races from 1m1f to 1m3f. Below is table showing performance data for all courses with at least 45 qualifying races, ordered by win strike rate. As can be seen, there is quite a difference between York, with the poorest front running record, and Musselburgh (the best):

 

 

This table illustrates how important it is to appreciate that UK courses vary so much when analysing certain stats sun as run style ones. That should come as no surprise because the turf courses especially are so different: some sharp, some undulating, some stiff, and so on. That is why the pace maps on the Geegeez racecard are like gold dust. Having past run style insights for a specific course and distance (and going and field size) gives us a huge edge when gauging how important a factor run style is likely to be.

As you know, I am a huge believer that run style can be the key to unlocking the winner of many races. It is something I strongly feel that all punters should include in their form analysis. I hope that, if you're not already, the findings in this article might encourage you to start!

Good luck.

- DR

Jockey Profiles: Best of the Rest

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This is the fifth and final article in my series of articles on jockeys, writes Dave Renham. In this piece I will be looking at three more top jockeys trying to pinpoint their strongest stats, be it positive or negative. As with the previous four articles I have analysed the last eight full years of flat racing in the UK and Ireland (2015-2022). I have used the Geegeez Query Tool as well as the Profiler Tool, amongst other things. In all the tables the profits/losses quoted are to Industry SP, but I have shared Betfair Starting Price where appropriate. Let's start with last season's champion jockey...

William Buick Jockey Profile

William Buick became Godolphin’s first choice jockey in 2016 and hence it should come as no surprise that within a year his win strike rate soon began to edge up:

 

 

As we can see from 2017 onwards he has achieved yearly strike rates in excess of 20%, with 2022 being a particularly good year. His overall record reads as follows:

 

 

Buick backers incurred relatively modest losses to Industry SP when we look at all races as a whole. Considering he has had over 4000 rides this is quite impressive. To BSP, backing Buick ‘blind’, you would have made a profit of £317.71 (ROI +7.5%).

Let us now look at his performance for different trainers over this eight year period (minimum 100 rides):

 

 

Buick when teaming up with his boss, Godolphin trainer Charlie Appleby, has secured a strike rate edging close to three wins in every ten rides. Not only that, they have combined to virtually break even to SP, with profits to BSP hitting £139.33 (ROI 9.6%). Indeed, to BSP they have secured profits in six of the last seven seasons. His record is less impressive when riding for the Gosden stable – a stable for whom he has been stable jockey in the past - with a modest strike rate of under 15% and poor returns.

One trainer not in the table due to the minimum ride stipulation is Sir Michael Stoute. Buick and Stoute do not team up that regularly, but when they do their record is excellent – 19 wins from 73 (SR 26%) for a profit of £42.07 (ROI +57.6%). To BSP profits that increases to £57.59 (ROI +78.9%). Their PRB figure is excellent also standing at 0.68.

One thing I like about Buick is that he is an excellent rider from the front. He wins on board virtually one ride in three when taking the early lead. Here are his win percentage splits for the four main run styles:

 

 

Buick follows the usual trend in that his front running rides win more often than his prominent ones which in turn out-perform mid div / hold up rides. For the record, at distances of 1m2f or less his front running strike rate stands at 35.1%; at 1m3f or longer it drops to 19.1%.

As regular readers will know, I like to look at favourite run style data, too, as this eliminates any potential selection bias regarding ‘good horses at the front, bad ones at the back’. Here are the relative win strike rates for Buick-ridden favourites in terms of the four main run styles:

 

 

Again, front running market leaders did best by some margin, while favourites that raced mid-division early had a very poor record: these runners would have lost you 26p for every £1 bet. Buick's record on held up favourites are a lot stronger than most jockeys, presumably because of the number of Godolphin horses able to outclass their opposition.

Before moving on, let us look at some additional statistics for the reigning champ:

  1. Buick has a great record at Newmarket from a significant number of rides. Specifically, he scored on 212 winners from 843 (SR 25.2%) for a BSP profit of £94.09 (ROI +11.2%). When riding for Charlie Appleby at HQ the record is even more impressive – 132 winners from 412 rides (SR 32%) for a BSP profit of £93.34 (ROI +22.7%).
  2. In contrast, at York his record reads 24 wins from 197 (SR 12.2%) for a BSP loss of £41.53 (ROI -21.1%).
  3. On 2yos Buick has won 25% of races returning a BSP return of 6p in the £.
  4. On 2yos having their second career start Buick has a strike rate of 1 in 3 and has returned a profit to BSP of just over 15 pence in the £.

Buick is a very good all round jockey who I am always happy to see riding a horse I fancy.

 

Jim Crowley Jockey Profile

Jim Crowley is a seasoned campaigner, and retained rider for the Shadwell operation, who is right up there when it comes to win rate. Here is his overall record going back to 2015:

 

 

These are excellent stats and backing all Crowley runners to BSP would have yielded a profit of £424.79 to £1 level stakes, equating to returns of nearly 8p in the £.

Crowley rides for numerous different trainers and there are 16 trainers for whom he has ridden more than 100 times. Here are their stats:

 

 

We see some very good stats here with seven of the 16 trainers showing a blind profit to Industry SP; and 11 trainers showing a profit to BSP.

Crowley has produced excellent results with horses from the top two in the betting when riding for Owen Burrows, William Haggas and the Gosden stable. All three have yielded good BSP returns on investment (Burrows +19.8%, Haggas +16% and the Gosden stable +8.6%).

In terms of courses, Crowley has ridden more than 100 times at 18 different venues. Here are the A/E indices at these tracks:

 

 

It is very impressive to note that eight courses have A/E indices in excess of 1.00 with Nottingham hitting a remarkable 1.57. His overall Nottingham stats are unsurprisingly outstanding – 43 wins from 131 rides (SR 32.8%) for an SP profit of £159.14 (ROI +121.5%). To BSP this improves to a profit of £186.86 (ROI +142.6%). His PRB course figure is also very strong standing at 0.65.

Here are a couple of stats for Crowley that are also worth sharing:

  1. He has an excellent record in very small fields. In races of five runners or fewer he has won 144 races from 410 rides (SR 35.1%) for a BSP profit of £130.46 (ROI +31.8%). He has made a profit to industry SP also of £84.64 (ROI +20.6%).
  2. On front runners he has performed especially well for trainers Charlie Hills and Owen Burrows. This is particularly true in races of 1 mile or less where Crowley hits the 34% win percentage mark for both trainers.

Crowley is hugely experienced and this shows in his stats.

 

Oisin Murphy Jockey Profile

Oisin Murphy was British Champion Jockey in 2019, 2020 and 2021. He did not race in 2022 as he was banned for two failed breath tests and breaking coronavirus rules but has resumed riding with a win percentage of 17.5% in 2023, slightly above his overall record as can be seen in the table below:

 

 

These are sound stats given Murphy has taken over 2000 more rides than Buick and 1000 more than Crowley, despite missing the whole of 2022! He clearly is a rider who does not have an issue with being busy. Like Crowley he has ridden 100 times or more for several trainers and here are the stats (ordered by strike rate):

 

 

Although he has not made a profit to SP when riding for Saeed bin Suroor, they are a combination to keep an eye on. The PRB of 0.70 is particularly high and, when betting to BSP, they have snuck into profit. Indeed to BSP, all bar Simcock and Williams have produced a profit with Oisin in the plate. Keeping with the BSP theme, if we combine all nine trainers, then Murphy has made a profit with them as a group in every year from 2015 to 2021. The combined yearly returns to BSP are shown in the graph below:

 

 

It is rare to get seven profitable years in a row when combining as many as nine different trainers.

There are four other trainers to keep an eye out for where Murphy has had less than 100 rides in each case. They are the Harry & Roger Charlton barn (10 wins from 32), Mick Appleby (16 wins from 66), John & Thady Gosden (31 wins from 84) and John Butler (8 wins from 21).

Murphy has a notably good record on 2yos with an overall strike rate in the review period of 17.4% thanks to 256 winners from 1473 runners. To Industry SP these runners yielded small losses of just under 4p in the £; to BSP, however, this turns into a profit of over 13 pence in the £. Here are three additional 2yo stats worth sharing:

  1. 2yos that have started in the top four of the betting have provided 226 wins from 971 runners (SR 23.3%) for a BSP profit of £92.32 (ROI +9.5%)
  2. For the Gosden stable he has had 14 2yo winners from just 39 runners (SR 35.9%) for a BSP profit of £12.08 (ROI +31.0%)
  3. 2yos that Murphy has taken into the lead early have won over 30% of their races. But...
  4. 2yos that were held up by Murphy have won just 8.4% of the time

Continuing with the run style theme, I have always liked Murphy from the front as an angle. Indeed, if your crystal ball was in mint condition and you had predicted pre-race all of Oisin's front runners in all races (not just 2yo ones), you would have been rewarded with an SP profit of £312.85 (ROI +30.9%). To BSP returns were nearer 45p in the £.

Looking at his run style record on favourites we see the same pattern we have seen numerous time before:

 

 

Front running favourites do best as is the norm and they would have been profitable to the tune of 12p in the £. Prominent racers would have seen you lose 2p in £, mid div 'jollies' lost 24p for every £1 bet, while hold ups lost 19p.

 

Here are some additional stats for Murphy, starting with two negative ones:

  1. Murphy has a poor record with very short priced runners. On horses priced 8/13 or shorter he has had 61 wins from 112 (SR 54.5%) for losses to Industry SP of £28.10 (ROI –25.1%)
  1. With big-priced runners his record is poor also. Horses priced 28/1 or bigger accounted for just four winners and nine placed runners from 337. Losses to Industry SP stood at £206.00 (ROI –61.1%). To BSP it improves a little but he still lost over 42p in the £
  1. Murphy has achieved a strike rate of 20% or more at five courses (with a minimum of 100 rides) – these are Chelmsford 20.1%, Newcastle 21.5%, Nottingham 20%, Salisbury 21.1% and Wolverhampton 20.5%. Four of the five have yielded blind profits to BSP (Wolverhampton being the only track that has not)
  1. When teaming up with Hughie Morrison at Nottingham they are 6 wins from just 13 runners. They have also had two seconds at 14/1 and 12/1. When riding at Lingfield for Archie Watson, Murphy is 12 wins from 35 (SR 34.3%) for a BSP profit of £11.80 (ROI +33.7%)

I really like Murphy as a jockey and I especially look for horses he is riding that may take the lead early.

 

MAIN TAKEWAYS

Below is a summary of my key findings, firstly for William Buick:

  1. Buick has a good record riding for his boss Charlie Appleby, making a blind profit to BSP with a decent strike rate. He also has a good record when booked to ride for the Stoute stable
  2. He is outstanding from the front especially in races of ten furlongs or less.
  3. He has a very good record at Newmarket for all trainers, but especially with Appleby. At York his record is relatively poor.
  4. His record with 2yos is decent, with second starters doing particularly well.

Onto Jim Crowley now:

  1. Crowley has a strike rate of better than one win in four with four trainers (100 rides or more) – John & Thady Gosden, William Haggas, Roger Varian and Owen Burrows. Three of the four have yielded a profit to Industry SP
  2. He has an outstanding record when riding at Nottingham
  3. In small fields of five runners or less Crowley has been exceptional

And finally Oisin Murphy:

  1. Murphy has a good record with many trainers he rides regularly for.
  2. Harry & Roger Charlton, Mick Appleby, John & Thady Gosden, and John Butler are trainers he rides less often for but his record with all four is excellent.
  3. He goes well on 2yo runners.
  4. He is excellent when riding from the front.
  5. He has a relatively poor record with very short priced runners (8/13 or shorter); likewise with outsiders priced 28/1 or bigger.
  6. Two trainer/jockey course combinations to note are Murphy and Morrison at Nottingham, and Murphy and Watson at Lingfield.

*

So I have come to the end of this series on jockeys. Of course, I have barely scratched the surface as there are hundreds of riders I have not analysed at all. Most punters have favourite jockeys or indeed ‘lucky’ ones, but digging into the stats is a worthwhile use of all of our time. Building up a picture of strengths and weaknesses is important, and with Geegeez’s tools - especially the Profiler and Query Tool - it is not difficult to do or time consuming. In fact, it's fun!

Other jockeys you may want to look at in your own time include James Doyle, Andrea Atzeni, Jack Mitchell, Kevin Stott and Adam Kirby; or indeed whoever interests you. If you find anything noteworthy, feel free to comment below as it will help the Geegeez community. Until next time, when I'll be looking at something different, stay lucky.

- DR

Jockey Profiles: Ireland, Flat

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This is the fourth in my series of articles on jockeys, and this time I am examining the performance of some riders in Ireland, writes Dave Renham.

As with the previous three articles I am analysing the last eight full years of flat racing (2015-2022) but focusing solely on Irish results. For the majority of the number crunching I will be using the Geegeez Query Tool, but I will also use the Profiler tool amongst other things. In all the tables the profits/losses quoted will be to Industry SP, but I will share Betfair SP where appropriate.

The first point to make is that you should not blindly compare Irish jockey strike rates with their UK counterparts. This is because the average field size in Ireland is bigger than it is in the UK. In the past eight seasons, the average number of runners in a UK flat race stands at 9.2; in Ireland this jumps markedly to 11.7. If we compare by year we see that the gap in the last couple of years has increased further:

 

 

Hence strike rates for jockeys racing in Ireland are going to be lower than for jockeys racing in the UK. If we want to compare jockeys across the Irish Sea against each other, then the PRB figure (Percentage of Rivals Beaten) is a better barometer to use.

 

Jockey Performance in All Races

Let us first look at all jockeys that have ridden at least 400 times in the past eight seasons in Ireland. I have included all of them, rather than hand pick those with the highest strike rates. The reason for this is that I do not know that much about some Irish jockeys so I am keen to absorb all the stats I can:

 

 

As we can see there are no jockeys in profit to SP with many heavily in the minus.

Anyone who read my Ryan Moore article will be familiar with his overall stats. Moore is comfortably ahead of the rest with a crazy strike rate, thanks as we know in the main to his partnership with trainer Aidan O’Brien. The next best strike rate is owned by Colin Keane, on 14.83%, which is less than half the figure of Moore! Speaking of Keane, let us dig a little further into his stats:

Colin Keane

Keane is stable jockey to Ger Lyons, a relationship that began in 2014. Keane has been Champion Jockey in Ireland in four of the last six seasons (2017, 2020, 2021, 2022), and in 2021 he had his highest number of wins in a season with 156. Let us look at his record with different trainers (minimum 50 rides), ordered by number of runs:

 

 

There are some strong PRB figures here, with Keane securing a PRB of 0.60 or better with eight different trainers. Naturally, the most rides have been for Lyons, but the O’Callaghan combination completely stands out. In 2022, they teamed up 18 times and nine of those horses ended up in the winner’s enclosure. They have partnered up at 14 different Irish courses and had winners at ten of them! Three of the courses where they have not had a winner have been at courses where Keane has ridden for O’Callaghan just once.

Two trainers perhaps to avoid are Martin and Mc Court – both have relatively poor figures in comparison to the average, though are still at least 50% of rivals beaten together.

For Ger Lyons, Keane is close to one win in five which is excellent. Here is a graph of their trainer/jockey combo in terms of yearly strike rate – looking at both win strike rate and each way strike rate:

 

 

There were slight dips in 2018 and 2022, but generally quite consistent figures. It should be noted that 2023 started very poorly, so this is something we need to keep our eye on. Things have improved in June and hopefully the pairing are back to normal service resumed now.

Here are three of the most potent Keane/Lyons stats:

  1. 2yo horses have done extremely well with 177 wins from 759 runners (SR 23.3%). To SP, returns have shown a small 3p in the £ loss. To BSP though a profit of £65.91 would have been made equating to returns of over 8p in the £.
  2. Clear favourites have won 233 races from 572 races (SR 40.7%) for a BSP profit of £49.66 (ROI +8.7%).
  3. Horses making their debut have an outstanding record. Of the 333 debutants, 71 have won (SR 21.3%) for a BSP profit of £158.33 (ROI +47.6%). Profits to SP were smaller but still returned just under 20p in the £.

Moving back to looking at Keane’s overall record again, it is time to consider some of his run style data. Geegeez members will know I am a big fan of looking at favourite run style data as this eliminates any potential selection bias regarding ‘good horses at the front, bad ones at the back’. Here are the relative win strike rates for Keane horses that have started as the market leader in terms of the four main run styles:

 

 

No surprises here with front running favourites doing clearly best. This is an even stronger bias than we normally see with hold up favourites scoring less than one win in every four. Front runners, meanwhile, would have secured a profit of around 24p in the £ to SP assuming our crystal ball could have accurately predicted that they would all go forward as well as being favourite. This profit would jump to 30p in the £ if backing them all to BSP.

 

Seamie Heffernan

Heffernan has some interesting run style stats when we focus on shorter distance races of 5f to 7f. Below are his strike rates both from a win and each way perspective:

 

 

As can be seen, Heffernan’s record on front runners from both a win and placed viewpoint is top notch. The figures for hold up horses in these shorter distance races are very weak – fewer than one in twenty winning, fewer than one in eight placing.

Heffernan has ridden 103 front runners in these 5-7f races for trainer Aidan O’Brien and has won on 38 of them (SR 36.9%). For the same trainer over the same distance spread, we see hold up horses claiming just 12 wins from 153 (SR 7.8%). Of the 153, 77 came from the top three in the betting! Now I appreciate I probably have the largest and noisiest ‘drum’ when it comes to run style stats in the whole of the racing world but when the numbers look like this, I just have to make you aware.

 

Horses from top three in the betting, by jockey

As the main table indicated, most jockeys have modest profit records at best when looking at their rides as a whole. Let’s look at how they have performed in terms of when they are riding a fancied runner – specifically, a horse in the top three in the betting. Here are the jockeys who have secured the best strike rates (minimum 100 runners):

 

 

Moore tops the list once more; Keane is in 5th, while three jockeys have managed to secure a profit to SP, namely Shane B Kelly, Ben Coen and Connor King. The average A/E figure for all Irish riders on horses from the top three in the betting is 0.88, so a few of them are nicely above this figure.

A look now at the jockeys with the lowest strike rates (below 16%) with the same group of fancied horses:

 

 

These jockeys are probably ones to be wary of even if riding a horse that heads, or is near the head of, the market. They have produced some hefty losses as a group.

 

Jockeys on front running favourites

Earlier we saw that Colin Keane had an excellent record on favourites that took the lead early. Here are the jockeys with the highest strike rates with such runners, of which Keane is one of them:

 

 

Absolutely exceptional figures for Moore; in the previous article on Ryan I noted his excellent record on front running favourites when combining UK and Irish stats. To that we can now add that his Irish front running win stats are 15% higher than his UK ones. I also mentioned in that piece that Moore does not go to the front early as often as he should – this cements my feeling for time immemorial. Of course, many of Aidan O’Brien’s horses are steadily away which makes getting to the front more difficult.

 

Jockey Performance, by Racecourse

For this section I decided I would look for any big positives or negatives at the Irish courses as regards to jockeys. Here are my findings:

Ballinrobe – Shane Foley has the highest strike rate at the course (19.3%) thanks to 11 wins from 57; Rory Cleary is 0 from 41. To be fair Cleary has not had many good chances at the course;

Bellewstown – Declan McDonogh has a 20% win rate at the course (11 from 55) and provided a BSP profit of £32.79 (ROI +59.6%); he has a decent placed record too. Dylan Browne McMonagle has managed just two successes from 52 including just one from 22 with horses 7/1 or shorter;

Cork – Billy Lee has ridden 45 winners at the track in the past eight seasons (Colin Keane also has won 45) from 245 rides. He has secured strike rates above 20% at Cork in three of the past five seasons, and in six of the eight seasons you would have made a profit backing his runners to BSP. When teaming up with trainer Paddy Twomey, Lee has ridden 13 winners from just 33 runners which equates to a strike rate of 39.4%.

Curragh – Ryan Moore has a good record here with 109 winners from 393 rides (SR 27.7%). To BSP his mounts have virtually broken even. His record in Group 3 contests is eye catching – 29 wins from 59 (SR 49.2%) for a BSP profit of £48.07 (ROI +81.5%). Contrast Moore with the Curragh stats for Connor Hoban who has managed just two wins from 197 runners, though again opportunity is obviously not created equally for the two riders.

Dundalk – the course that stages by far the most Irish racing due to it being an all-weather track. Colin Keane seems to ride the track as well as any – he has had 1210 rides with 198 successes (SR 16.4%). A BSP profit of £81.56 (ROI +6.7%) would have been achieved backing all his rides blind. His record is quite consistent when analysing the data by year. Keane’s strike rate exceeds 20% when riding for his boss Ger Lyons and when riding for Noel Meade.

Fairyhouse – Rory Cleary is 0 from 101 at the track in the study period.

Killarney – Declan McDonogh is head and shoulders above the rest here with 26 wins from 104 rides (SR 25%) for a BSP profit of £170.64 (ROI +164.1%).

Leopardstown – Ryan Moore has 42 victories here and is just half a percentage off hitting a 30% win strike rate. You would have lost 11p in the £ however, even to BSP.

Naas – it is Ryan Moore again who has by far the best strike rate at 35.8% (29 wins from 81) for a 4p in the £ BSP return. Colin Keane and Seamie Heffernan are the only other two jockeys above the 15% mark.

Navan – Moore is a rare visitor here but has an impressive 13 from 31.

Tipperary – Billy Lee has the best record here – 39 wins from 214 (SR 18.2%) for a BSP profit of £72.48 (ROI +33.9%).

 

MAIN TAKEWAYS

Let me summarise the key findings:

  1. Irish races have bigger field sizes so we need to appreciate that when we compare Irish strike rates with UK ones;
  2. Ryan Moore has a 3 in 10 strike rate in all races. He has a fantastic record on front running favourites. He has a decent record at several tracks but take note whenever he makes a trip to Navan;
  3. Colin Keane has a very good record on debutants when riding for Ger Lyons. His ‘all runners’ record is outstanding for Michael O'Callaghan (though steadier so far in 2023). He also rides Dundalk as well as anyone and has an excellent strike rate on front running favourites;
  4. Shane B Kelly, Ben Coen and Connor King has proved profitable to follow when riding a fancied horse (first three in the betting);
  5. Seamie Heffernan rides from the front exceptionally well in sprint races (5f to 7f). His record over the same distances on hold up horses is very poor;
  6. Billy Lee has good records at both Cork and Tipperary – each was highly profitable during the review period;
  7. Declan McDonogh is a jockey to follow at Killarney. His record is far superior to the rest.

----

This article has been very interesting to me to research because I personally rarely bet in Irish races; but during the research I’ve found a number of avenues to attack the flat racing puzzle there. I hope the findings have been interesting for you, too.

- DR

Jockey Profiles: Danny Tudhope and Ben Curtis

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This is the third in my series of articles on jockeys, and in this one I am examining the two jockeys who have ridden the most winners at northern or Scottish tracks in the past eight seasons, namely Danny Tudhope and Ben Curtis, writes Dave Renham. Between them they have ridden over 7500 horses in this part of the UK, winning 1242 races (Tudhope 687 wins, Curtis 555), and these runners have accounted for about 75% of Tudhope’s total rides in the UK/Ireland and about 64% of Curtis’s. They have both been successful ‘down south’ as well; Tudhope, for example, has ridden four winners on two separate occasions in Royal Ascot festivals – once in 2019 and then again in 2022.

As with the previous two articles I am analysing the last eight full years of flat racing in the UK and Ireland (2015-2022). I am using the Profiler Tool along with the Query Tool as the main vehicles for my data gathering. In all the tables profits/losses quoted are to Industry SP, but I will quote Betfair SP where appropriate.

Let’s start with Tudhope.

Danny Tudhope Jockey Profile

Danny Tudhope: Overall Record

Let me first review Tudhope’s overall stats by looking at his performance on every single runner during this eight-year period:

 

 

This is a very presentable set of figures – a win rate of roughly one win in every six and very modest losses of just over 7½ pence in the £ to SP. Indeed, to BSP this would have been converted into a profit of £317.49 (ROI +6.1%), with five of the individual years showing 'in the black' against the machine. Tudhope's A/E index, a ratio that essentially determines value, is above the average for all jockeys, as is his PRB figure.

 

Danny Tudhope: Record by Year

Yearly stats are the next port of call. Here is a breakdown by both win and win/placed (Each Way) percentage / Strike Rate (SR%):

 

 

As can be seen, 2019 was his best year hitting the winners' enclosure on nearly one in five of his rides. Overall, Tudhope's performance has been very consistent both from a win and placed perspective, which is something one always likes to see. This consistency can be viewed even more clearly when we look at his yearly PRB (Percentage of Rivals Beaten) figures:

 

 

 

Danny Tudhope: Record by Betting Odds / Price (SP)

The Profiler on Geegeez gives a breakdown of performance by Starting Price splitting the market into seven price brackets. Tudhope’s figures are as follows:

 

 

At the shorter prices (9/4 or less) his figures are slightly below what would be expected, certainly in terms of returns. The remaining figures are slightly above what might be expected in terms of returns. His strike rate of 5.16% on horses priced 16/1 to 25/1 is well above the figure for ALL jockeys, which stands at only 3.47%. The same is true when looking at the 9/1 to 14/1 price bracket – Tudhope’s SR% stands at 7.96%, the ALL jockey figure stands at 6.56%. These mid- to bigger-priced horses have definitely offered some value for punters over the past eight seasons, though with single digit hit rates, it can be a long time between drinks!

 

Danny Tudhope: Record by Distance

A look at Tudhope’s record at different distances now. I have grouped them into five distance bands as with the previous two jockey pieces, and once again it is win strike rates that are being compared:

 

 

Similar strike rates, although the longest distance win percentage is slightly below the others. This might be due to the smaller sample size of 139 races. Tudhope primarily rides in races of 1 mile or less – roughly 75% of all his rides have been over these shorter distances with an even split between 5-6f and 7f-1m. Personally, I am a fan of Tudhope in sprints – he is excellent when on a front runner in these 5-6f races, winning over 30% of the time (92 wins from 300). Backing all these runners would have yielded a profit of £161.01 to SP (ROI +53.7%). Clearly we are never totally sure which horse is going to front run, but if a Tudhope sprinter does go to the front early it is cause for optimism. For the record, his returns on front runners have been virtually identical in handicap sprints and non-handicap sprints.

He also has a winning strike rate of around 27% in 7f-1m races on front runners which is equally as eye-catching, if not more so (N.B. average SR% for ALL jockeys on 7f-1m front runners is 18%).

 

Danny Tudhope: Record By Racecourse

I am now going to look at all courses where Tudhope has had at least 150 rides. The courses are listed alphabetically:

 

 

As expected, the majority of the courses in the table are northern English or Scottish tracks. Overall there is a fair smattering of profitable courses. When looking at market factors and taking out some of the bigger priced winners, four courses stand out, namely Beverley, Musselburgh, Redcar and Ripon. Tudhope riding at any of these should generally be considered to be a positive. At Beverley it is worth noting that restricting Tudhope to horses that were either favourite or second favourite would have yielded 46 winners from 142 rides (SR 32.4%) for an SP profit of £31.63 (ROI +22.3%). To BSP this edges up to +£47.88 (ROI +33.7%).

 

Danny Tudhope: Record by Trainer

Time to examine the trainer stats and below are all the trainers (still in business) for whom Tudhope has had at least 100 rides. They are ordered by strike rate.

 

 

Tudhope is David O’Meara’s stable jockey which explains the huge number of rides for the Yorkshire handler. He has a very good strike rate when riding for the William Haggas stable, but a good proportion of these rides have been at short prices. A couple of courses stand out with the Haggas / Tudhope combination: firstly they are 8 from 17 at Redcar, while at Newcastle they have secured 11 wins from just 23 runs.

He has profitable records to SP when riding for Archie Watson and Karl Burke. In fact, when riding for Watson, which he has done between 2017 and 2022, five of those six years produced a profit to BSP.

There are three trainers that should be mentioned, although none made the above table due to not having enough rides to qualify. They are Kevin Ryan, James Bethell and Sir Michael Stoute. Tudhope has a good record with all three both from a strike rate and a returns perspective.

 

Danny Tudhope: Record by Run Style

Onto run style now. I have already shared the fact that Tudhope has an excellent front running record on horses that race between 5f and 1m. Here is a breakdown of his run style performance in terms of percentage of runners that match each one:

 

 

These figures are very similar to those you would find if you averaged out all jockeys in the weighing room. It is a shame he has not led early on more than 15.4% of all horses considering how effective he is from the front. Of course, that style doesn't suit all horses on all occasions.

Tudhope wins more often with front running horses than with prominent racers, which in turn out-perform midfield racers and those held up early. This is the normal pattern we see for virtually all jockeys on the flat.

 

Danny Tudhope: Record by Market Factors

As regular readers will know I am a big fan of looking at favourite run style data, too, as this eliminates any potential selection bias regarding ‘good horses at the front, bad ones at the back’. Here are the relative win strike rates for Tudhope horses that have started as the market leader in terms of the four main run styles:

 

 

Front running favourites perform much the best. They secured a profit of around 15p in the £ assuming your crystal ball could have accurately predicted that they would all front run as well as being favourite. Tudhope has won from the front on favourites at all distances so is clearly an excellent judge of pace when leading, regardless of distance.

He is also one of the better jockeys from off the pace, especially in races at beyond a mile. In longer distance races I would not be put off by a Tudhope runner that habitually is held up.

I will summarize Danny Tudhope main takeaways at the end of the article, but now it is time to look at Ben Curtis.

 

Ben Curtis Jockey Profile

Ben Curtis Overall Record

Here are the overall stats for Ben Curtis:

 

 

Curtis has a slightly lower win strike rate than Tudhope, but still highly respectable, around the one win in seven mark. The A/E index of 0.95 is close to ‘value’ and to BSP Curtis would have secured punters a 4p in the £ profit across all his 5796 rides, which is mightily impressive.

 

Ben Curtis: Record by Year

Here is a breakdown by both win, and win/placed (Each Way) percentage / Strike Rate (SR%):

 

 

There has been a clear uptick when comparing 2018-2022 data with that from 2015-2017. This has occurred both from a win and each way perspective. There is a reason for this, as the improvement coincided with getting better rides as a whole from 2018: we can see this when we look at the prices of his runners year by year, especially the shorter end of the market. Here is a graph looking at the percentage of Curtis's rides by year that have been on horses priced 9/2 or shorter.

 

 

As the graph indicates, in 2022 compared with 2015 he rode more than double the number of horses sent off at 9/2 or shorter (in terms of percentage of his rides). Riding shorter priced runners improves the strike rate and that has been the driving force in the more recent past. I have said before that, where possible, we cannot be dependent on just one type of statistic. The more data and info we have at our fingertips the better, especially when it helps us understand why certain stats look the way they do.

 

Ben Curtis: Record by Betting Odds / Price (SP)

A look now at the Profiler splits in terms of Industry Starting Price:

 

 

The shortest priced runners (odds on) have, amazingly, nudged into SP profit. That is unusual. The 9/1 to 14/1 bracket has also seen him out-perform the average, certainly in terms of strike rate, as we saw with Tudhope earlier. It looks like the very big-priced runners (28/1 or more) are worth avoiding though – just 5 winners from 553 with losses of just over 62 pence for every £1 staked.

 

Ben Curtis: Record by Distance

Time to see if there are any clear differences when we look at Ben's record at different distances. Normally these figures are very similar, but it is always worth checking just in case:

 

 

As with Tudhope the very longest distances have the lowest strike rate, but again the sample size is smaller than the other categories – 197 races in the 1m7f+ sample. I would say Curtis has no major strengths or weaknesses when it comes to riding at different distances.

 

Ben Curtis: Record by Racecourse

Let's take a look at ‘Curtis by course’ – as before the courses are listed alphabetically and the minimum number of rides to qualify is 150:

 

 

Seven of the 19 courses have produced a profit to SP, with the Carlisle stats leaping off the page. At Carlisle Curtis has secured comfortably the highest strike rate compared to other courses, likewise the A/E index is the highest of all courses as is the PRB figure. Profits are extremely high, but we need to dig a bit deeper to see how many big-priced winners have affected the bottom line.

The biggest priced winner for Curtis at Carlisle has actually only been 25/1 so that makes these figures even more impressive. Below is the Carlisle breakdown by year, which is always useful to review for consistency:

 

 

Probably two things stand out initially. Firstly the eye is drawn to the poor performance in 2019 and, secondly, the 2015 profit figure accounts for over half of the eight year bottom line. Dealing with the poor 2019 – this is bound to happen when examining course/jockey stats. If you look at the PRB figure for that year it was similar to four of the six other years, so things are not as bad as they look at first glance. Also when delving in more detail into 2019, it emerges that Curtis rode eight horses at the course which finished second including at some reasonable prices – 6/1, 7/1, 8/1. With smaller data samples these ‘poor’ years will happen. Statistical variance, luck, quality of rides will all play a part too.

In terms of 2015 providing more than half the profit, it should be noted that four of the other six seasons made a profit, and decent profits at that. 2022 was a losing year, but his placed strike rate was actually the highest of any of the seasons (59%) so again perhaps not as ‘bad’ a year as the raw stats suggest.

All in all it is clear that Curtis rides Carlisle very well and, for the record, he has won for 24 different trainers at the course, so he is not reliant on a single handler, like so many jockeys are. He has also won for 30 different trainers at Beverley (57 winners).

 

Ben Curtis: Record by Trainer

That leads us nicely onto Curtis's performance for different trainers now. Below are all the trainers (still operating) for whom Curtis has had at least 100 rides. They are ordered by strike rate.

 

* including singular trainer name entities at the same yard

The combination with William Haggas is extremely good, although Curtis has only had nine rides for the stable in the past two seasons. Curtis has produced a profit to SP with horses from the top three in the betting for five of the trainers in the table; namely Haggas, Boughey, Palmer, Ellison and Appleby. He has only started riding for Boughey in the past three seasons but it is worth noting that on horses priced 6/1 or shorter the combo has produced a highly impressive 38 winners from 81 runners (SR 38.8%) for an SP profit of £22.10 (ROI +27.6%). To BSP returns increase to +36%. He has ridden a lot for Karl Burke in the past, but last year saw him have just six rides so it is not a combination that is going to produce many more runners it seems.

Before moving away from trainers, Curtis also has an excellent record when riding for two other trainers – for Charlie Hills he is 13 wins from 44 (SR 29.6%) and for George Scott 16 wins from 59 (SR 27.1%).

 

Ben Curtis: Record by Run Style

Onto run style now, and here is a breakdown of Curtis’s run style in terms of percentage of runners that match each one:

 

 

It is good to see he is above the average figure for ALL jockeys when it comes to front runners and also he is below the average for hold up horses. This to me suggests that he has some appreciation about the value of early track position.

Onto his win record on favourites in terms of run style:

 

 

Curtis has a slightly higher SR% figure on prominent favourites to the norm, but the general pattern is seen once more – there is such a simple answer to the question, ‘Would you prefer to be on a front running favourite or a held up favourite?’

It should also be shared that Curtis's front-running favourites were profitable to SP, as were the prominent racing favourites.

 

Danny Tudhope and Ben Curtis: Main Takeaways

The table below summarises the key takeaways for these two giants of the northern circuit:

 

 

So there you have it – two for the price of one!

I hope this article has uncovered a few more angles that may prove profitable for you to deploy over the coming months.

- DR

Jockey Profiles: Ryan Moore

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The second in my series of articles on jockeys and, this time, Ryan Moore comes under the microscope.

Ryan Moore Introduction

Ryan Moore was born in Brighton in 1983 and he rode his first winner in the year 2000. Three years later, he broke through the 50 winners in a year barrier and, in 2004, he notched up his first century (132). In his early career he rode primarily for Richard Hannon but, by the mid-2000s, Moore was getting an increasing number of rides for Sir Michael Stoute. It was for Sir Michael that he recorded his first Group 1 success with Notnowcato in the Juddmonte Stakes at York in August 2006. In 2011 he started being noticed by Aidan O’Brien and, by 2016, he had ridden over 100 times in a season for the Irish maestro in the UK and Ireland combined. The Coolmore Stud provided the vast majority of these rides from the Ballydoyle handler, giving Moore the opportunity to ride some of the very top horses in training. In 2017 he secured his 2000th British winner and Moore is a definitely a jockey who justifies a deep dive into his statistical performance.

As with the Hollie Doyle piece I have analysed the last eight full years of flat racing in the UK and Ireland (2015-2023). I have used the Profiler Tool along with the Query Tool as the main vehicles for my data gathering. In all the tables profit/loss quoted is to Industry SP, but I will quote Betfair SP where appropriate.

Ryan Moore: Overall Record

Let's first look at Moore’s overall stats by reviewing his performance on every single runner during this eight-year period:

 

 

An excellent strike rate for Moore, in excess of one win in every five, primarily due to the fact that a sizable percentage of his rides are on fancied runners at shorter prices. This market detail also partly accounts for the fact that the PRB figure is very high at 0.63. His A/E index, a ratio that essentially determines value, is around the average for all jockeys.

We can also see that backing all his rides blind would have secured losses of nearly 21p in the £ to SP; to BSP the returns improve, but we still would have lost around 12p for every £1 staked.

Ryan Moore: UK v Ireland

It is relevant to distinguish performance in the UK versus Ireland for Moore because there is a quite a difference:

 

 

As can be seen, Moore's record in Ireland is far superior in terms of win percentage. This is mainly due to the fact that, in Ireland, 93% of his rides have been for Aidan O’Brien, whereas in the UK this combo stands at just 17% of total rides. O’Brien runners are rarely big prices so as a result of this one would expect to see that high strike rate for Moore in Ireland. However, perhaps what is more significant is if we look at the data for horses from the top three in the betting, comparing Ryan's record in the UK with his record in Ireland.

 

 

We are now comparing like for like from a betting market perspective. And yet still we see a stronger performance in Ireland and a much higher strike rate, as well as significantly better returns and a stronger A/E index. It should be noted we get a similar set of results if using a price bracket of say 5/1 or less. Already I am thinking Moore riding in Ireland is something to keep an eye on.

Ryan Moore: Record by Year

Annual data are the next port of call. Here is a breakdown by win percentage / Strike Rate (SR%):

 

 

Six of the eight years have seen a strike rate of over 20%; 2019 and 2020 were the years to dip below that figure. One obvious reason that may help explain this lower level was that Aidan O’Brien slightly under-performed at the same time. Obviously that would have affected Moore’s record as he rides so regularly for the stable. Moreover, 2020 was Covid-affected with Moore largely unable to ride in Ireland: he had just 15 rides, across Irish Champions Weekend, with two wins and another five placed horses.

If we track the yearly strike rates of both trainer and jockey we can see there is a clear correlation:

 

 

As punters we need to appreciate that in most cases jockeys are only as good as the horses they are riding, and those primarily riding for top stables will win more often than jockeys who ride regularly for ‘lesser’ stables. This is why when researchers drill into data they often use price bands to compare in order to offer a fairer comparison (like I did earlier in the UK v Ireland – top three in the betting stats). Talking of price, let's look at this area next:

Ryan Moore: Record by Betting Odds / Price (SP)

The Profiler offers a breakdown of performance by Starting Price splitting the market into seven price brackets. I have taken Moore’s record straight from that table:

 

 

As can be seen, Moore does not ride many genuine outsiders – less than 50 rides on horses priced 28/1 or bigger in the last eight years. From the table, then, it looks sensible to concentrate on horses priced 17/2 or shorter. When using BSP with these shorter priced runners one would have lost only around 6p in the £ across 3549 qualifiers. That's not too bad given the huge sample. In fact we would have made a small profit to BSP last year (2022) on horses with an industry SP of 17/2 or shorter. Hindsight, eh?

One clear problem with jockeys as well renowned as Moore is securing value. How easy is it to obtain value on a Moore mount? Clearly it is not easy, so we need to keep digging!

Ryan Moore: Record by Distance

A look at Ryan's record at different distances now. I have grouped them into five distance bands. Again I am comparing strike rates:

 

 

The one distance bracket that stands out from a strike rate perspective is 1m1f to 1m3f. The data sample is considerable so one would guess there is something going on here. But what could be happening? The first point to clarify is there is not a field size-related bias, even if 7f-1m races have a slightly bigger average field size than other distances.

One factor could be that Moore rarely blasts his runners out of the gates and hence tends to front run in races less than the average jockey. With that in mind, this might be what is hindering his strike rate figures at shorter distances (less than a mile). Over longer distances the front running bias declines considerably and hence in 1m1f to 1m3f this is not such an issue. That is one plausible idea.

Another theory is linked to the fact he rides many of the best bred middle distance horses in the world, usually for O'Brien / Coolmore Stud. Indeed if you look at the distance stats for Moore when riding for O’Brien, the best distance range for the pair is also 1m1f to 1m3f – hitting close to a 31% success rate. Backing this combo over these distances would have yielded a BSP profit of over 15p in the £. This theory, which initially had plenty of logic to it, now has some evidence to give it 'real world' credibility.

My final word on this distance section is simply that Moore may just judge the pace of these 1m1f-1m3f races better than any other distance. That may also have some validity.

Ryan Moore: Record by Course

I am now going to look at all courses where Moore has had at least 75 rides in the eight year sample period. The courses are listed alphabetically:

 

 

As one might expect, achieving blind profits at individual courses is unlikely, but Moore has snuck into SP profit at Chelmsford and Sandown. Using BSP actually does not change things too much with only Naas additionally edging into profit and Lingfield hitting break even.

Moore's record at Goodwood offers up some interesting stats when we compare his data on favourites with other market ranks:

 

 

The ‘not favourite’ stats include plenty of runners that were near the head of the market – combining second and third favourites produced just 6 winners from 73! Goodwood obviously hosts highly competitive racing so we do have to factor that in when noting poor or modest looking results. But perhaps a crucial note is that Aidan O'Brien doesn't really target the Glorious Goodwood festival like he does other meetings. Indeed, of the 16 tracks where O'Brien has saddled 20+ runners in the months of July and August, Goodwood has the lowest each way strike rate of all. Moore rode 55 of APOB's 80 such runners during the study period.

Considering Grade 1 UK courses more broadly, punters need to be cautious when focusing strongly on one particular jockey. For example, I think the following table is quite an eye opener. It compares Moore riding favourites at Grade 1 UK tracks with favourites at  non-Grade 1 UK tracks. The Grade 1 UK tracks are Ascot, Doncaster, Epsom, Goodwood, Newbury, Newmarket, Sandown and York:

 

 

It should be noted that the average price of the favourites at the UK Grade 1 tracks was higher, which will have a bearing on the strike rate, but even taking that into account the numbers are still poles apart. I did check horses priced 2/1 or shorter across both types of track and the non-Grade 1 UK courses secured an 11% better strike rate then as well and much better returns of an extra 19p in the £. I rarely back favourites myself, but if there are favourite backers out there, bear those stats in mind if looking to back a Moore 'jolly'.

Before moving away from courses, the stats from these five courses where Moore did not ride at least 75 runners are actually worth sharing:

 

 

The sample sizes are not that small and the two stand out stats are the PRB figures for Wolves (0.84) and Navan (0.80) – these are exceptionally high.

Ryan Moore: Record by Trainer

Here are the trainers that Moore has ridden for at least 50 times (ordered by strike rate) – there are 11 in total:

 

  * includes prior trainer entities at the same establishment

 

Moore has a very good record when riding for the Charlton stable, especially with horses from the top three in the betting – with these runners his figures read 21 wins from 54 (SR 38.9%) for an SP profit of £34.03 (ROI +63.0%). William Haggas and Charlie Hills are also trainers that Moore has done well for and, as a general rule, when the jockey teams up with either of these trainers I would look at it as a positive.

As expected Aidan O'Brien and Sir Michael Stoute provide Moore with the vast majority of his rides, with O'Brien offering better stats in that particular battle.

We saw earlier that the overall Ireland versus UK stats differed markedly for Moore. It makes sense therefore to compare Moore’s record with O'Brien when riding in the UK compared with Ireland. The graph below plots the relative win and win/placed (each way) strike rates:

 

 

We can see a much stronger set of results for Irish races in terms of wins and places. This was to be expected, with there being a heavy selection bias when Moore catches a plane to ride, but it is still nice to see that confirmed. Losses to level stakes correlated with the strike rates meaning they were much steeper in the UK than in Ireland for this jockey trainer combination - 16.5% in the UK, 5.8% in Ireland. This equates to a difference of nearly 11 pence in the £.

Ryan Moore: Record by Run Style

Onto run style now. Here is a breakdown of Moore’s run style in terms of percentage of runners that match each of the four styles measured on geegeez.co.uk:

 

 

These figures are very similar to those you would find if you averaged out all the jockeys in the weighing room. Ryan has raced from the front on 14% of his rides which equates to roughly one in every seven. However, there is a big difference if we compare the percentage of Moore front runners in handicaps to non-handicaps. In handicaps he has taken the early lead in just 9.7% of races, in non-handicaps the figure is 16.7%.

In sprint handicaps (5-6f) Moore has led early just 20 times in 264 races, which equates to just 7.6% of the time. This stat does baffle me. As regular readers will know, front runners in sprint handicaps generally have a huge edge. Moore clearly does not think like this – if he did that figure would be much much higher.

Moore follows the usual trend of jockeys where his front runners win more often than his prominent racers who in turn out-perform mid div and those held up early. I always look at favourite run style data, too, as this eliminates any potential selection bias regarding 'good horses at the front, bad ones at the back'. Here are the relative win strike rates for Moore-ridden favourites in terms of the four main run styles:

 

 

Over half of his front-running favourites went onto win. It should come as no surprise therefore that one would have made a healthy profit on Moore-ridden front-running favourites, while significant losses were incurred on favourites that were held up or raced midfield early. Moore on Aidan O'Brien-trained front-running favourites have an astonishing record: 60 wins from 94 runners (SR 63.8%). If your crystal ball had predicted these runners pre-race, you would been able to secure a huge profit of £52.36 (ROI +55.7%).

Ryan "More": Extra stats and nuggets

With the main body of the article complete allow me to share a few extra statistics that may be of interest:

  1. When riding a horse making its debut in the UK, Moore has won 44 times from 333 runs (SR 13.2%) for significant losses of £143.36 (ROI -43.1%). Even when these debutants have started favourite such runners made losses of around 29p in the £. Compare this to Irish debutants who have won over 25% of the time (23 wins from 90). This is another example of the O'Brien factor.
  2. Keep an eye on horses that are having their second career start where Moore was also on board for their debut. This cohort has produced 39 winners from 111 (SR 35.1%) for a small SP profit of £3.27 (ROI +3.0%). To BSP this improves to +£18.73 (ROI +16.9%).
  3. Moore has a better strike rate at Royal Ascot compared with all other Ascot meetings combined. At Royal Ascot his strike rate is 18.6%; all other Ascot meetings combined this figure is just 12.7%. At Royal Ascot (2015-2022) backing Moore blind would have yielded a BSP profit of £44.91 (ROI +18.2%).

Ryan Moore Main Takeaways

  1. Moore has a much higher strike rate in Ireland than in the UK (the O'Brien factor).
  2. Moore's form is heavily influenced by the form of the Aidan O'Brien stable, especially when racing over the Irish Sea.
  3. Moore has excelled at middle distances of 1m1f to 1m3f for all trainers, but especially so for O'Brien.
  4. At Grade 1 UK tracks it is difficult to find value when Moore is riding.
  5. Away from Grade 1 UK tracks Moore has made a small profit on all rides sent off favourite.
  6. He has an excellent record at both Navan and Wolverhampton (samples are modest but the PRB figures are insane).
  7. He has a very good record when riding for the Charlton stable, especially if they are in the top three of the betting. Charles Hills and William Haggas are trainers for whom he has solid records also.
  8. Moore has an outstanding record on front runners that start favourite. This is especially true if trained by O'Brien.
  9. The three extra nuggets shared immediately above.

*

So that wraps up my Ryan Moore profile. There is clearly no doubting Moore's qualities as a jockey – from a personal point of view, I just wish he would race close to or up with pace more often, especially in races of a mile or less. Given his superstar profile it is difficult but, as I hope you've discovered, not impossible to squeeze some juice out of Ryan Moore's value lemon.

Until next time...

- DR

Jockey Profiles: Hollie Doyle

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The first in a new series of articles looking at jockeys, this one will be focusing on Hollie Doyle, writes Dave Renham.

Hollie is still just 26 and has risen up the ranks quickly. She began as an apprentice at the Richard Hannon yard in 2014 and, by 2017, had ridden out her claim. Incidentally, in 2016, while still a five pound claimer, she rode a 25/1 winner for a geegeez.co.uk syndicate, Table Manners trained by Wilf Storey at Newcastle.

The 2019 campaign was her first real milestone when she rode 116 winners, in doing so setting a new record for the number of winners achieved by a female jockey in Britain. The following year, 2020, was another big one with her first win at Royal Ascot, her first Group race success, a win on Champions Day at Ascot (the first female to achieve this) swiftly followed in the next race by her first Group 1 triumph, aboard Glen Shiel. Since then Hollie has continued to go from strength to strength and is unquestionably one of the top jockeys around.

**

How to Use Profiler

Normally when gathering data for my articles on Geegeez, I use Query Tool or Draw Analyser or Pace analyser, or a combination of the three.  However, for this piece I obtained a good chunk of the data from the Profiler tool. You can find Profiler by clicking on the ‘Tools’ menu item. Once there, you will be presented with this somewhat sparse screen, and an invitation to "Enter a horse, trainer, jockey or sire name to begin":

 

 

As that instruction suggests, Profiler allows us to drill down into the record of any horse, trainer, jockey or sire. It is the same principle for each research area, but if wanting to research a jockey such as Hollie Doyle, we need to type their name into the Search bar at the top, and click the 'Jockeys tab'. This will display the following:

 

 

Clicking the 'Profile' button populates the 17 categories highlighted in blue in the first screen shot and thus creates a huge web page full of data. As the first variable in the list, the going stats will be displayed at the top and for Hollie Doyle’s search they came up as follows:

 

 

As can be seen we have a wealth of data, both win and each way. We also have a PRB figure (percentage of rivals beaten) which is an excellent ‘extra’ stat. Having data for 17 different categories all on one page is extremely useful.

For this piece I needed to adjust the Date Range filters because I wanted to look specifically at the years from 2015 to 2022. I also wanted to look at both flat (turf) and all weather racing so I set the filters as follows: (N.B. these filters were in place for the Going data shown above):

 

 

There are a number of other filters so, for example, you can look at just handicap data if you wish, just the wins, and so on. Also, we can drill into National Hunt racing data if we want to. It should be noted that when using the Profiler, it returns both UK and Irish results combined.

OK, so I have my parameters set, now it's time to dig into the stats. Before sharing my findings I should mention that as well as using the Profiler Tool for this research, I have used other sources,  including Query Tool. In all the tables profits/losses quoted are to Industry SP; I will quote Betfair SP where appropriate.

 

Hollie Doyle: Overall Record

Let us first look at Doyle’s baseline figures across every single runner during this eight-year period:

 

 

This is a thoroughly decent record: her A/E index of 0.91 is above the ‘average’ figure for all jockeys, which is 0.86. Likewise, her overall PRB figure of 0.54 is nicely above the 0.50 average mark. Losses of around 16 pence in the £ to SP convert to close to breaking even (losses of under 2p in the £) at exchange SP.

 

Hollie Doyle: Record by Year

I first wish to breakdown Doyle's stats by year. Here is a breakdown showing win percentage (or Strike Rate (SR%) if you prefer):

 

 

We can easily ignore the first year in the sample, 2015, as Hollie only had 39 rides in that year; and we can see how it often goes for a top jockey rising out of the apprentice ranks: a steady start launches into high strike rates as the claim's value is utilised, followed by a more challenging period post-riding out the claim, before blossoming into a top tier rider.

Hollie's profile mimics this perfectly: she rode out her claim in 2017 before a season of consolidation - more rides but fewer winners in 2018 - after which the last four years have seen her highest strike rates. Not only have the last four years seen her highest strike rates, but her most consistent ones too. 2019 to 2022 have seen strike rates within 1.3% of each other.

 

Hollie Doyle: Record by Distance

A look at her record at different distances now. I have grouped them into five distance bands and, again, I am comparing win strike rates:

 

 

The highest strike rate has occurred in the longer distance events (1m 7f or more); but, having said that, the data set is much smaller (just 199 races). Compare that to the 7f to 1 mile results which come from 1920 races, almost ten times as many. The vast majority of Doyle’s rides come in races of 1 mile or less – roughly 69% of all her rides have been over these shorter distances. This, in fact, perfectly mirrors the percentage of races which are run at a mile or shorter, which is unsurprising, I guess.

In a previous article on jockeys and run style I highlighted Doyle as a jockey that does well in handicaps on front runners; in sprints (5 to 6f) and also races of 7f to 1 mile. I will look in more detail at her run style data later.

 

Hollie Doyle: Record by Betting Odds / Price (SP)

Profiler gives a breakdown of performance by starting price splitting it up into seven price brackets. I have taken Hollie’s record straight from that table:

 

 

If you had backed all Doyle’s mounts focusing on the shorter end of the price (17/2 or shorter), you would have lost only 5p in the £. To Betfair SP though, that would have turned into a small profit of just over 4p in £. However, the value to be had with these runners has largely evaporated now she's a relative household name. In terms of very big priced runners (28/1 or bigger) only a handful have won. These have produced significant losses to SP and even to BSP losses stand at a weighty 35p in the £.

Hollie Doyle: Record by Course

I am now going to look at all courses where Hollie Doyle has had at least 75 rides. The courses are listed alphabetically in the table below:

 

 

I want to mention that course strike rates can sometimes be slightly misleading due to the average field sizes being vastly different from one track to another. For example, in the past eight seasons, the average field size (all races) at Ascot has been just under 12; contrast this with Ffos Las whose average has been around 7.6. Hence, using solely strike rates when comparing Ascot  with Ffos Las is not a statistically sensible play. I am not saying that a course strike rate is without use but, as with any single piece of information, it is useful to combine it with others.

The two stats that most interest me from a course perspective are the A/E indices and the PRB figures. Doyle’s figures for Yarmouth stand out with an A/E index of 1.30 and a PRB figure of 0.58. In addition the strike rate is high and she has made decent profits to SP. Her profits to BSP stand at an even more impressive +£90.55 (ROI +65.6%), and these figures are not skewed by any huge priced winners. It is also noteworthy that she has ridden winners at Yarmouth for a good number of different trainers (21 in total), so it is not one or two specific trainers providing all of the winning rides. Sticking with Yarmouth for one more stat, when Doyle has been riding a horse priced 8/1 or shorter she has secured 28 win from 88 rides. This equates to an excellent strike rate of 32%.

Before moving away from courses, one course that did not make the list due to having had only 46 rides was Pontefract. The stats, though, are very strong despite this smallish sample – 14 wins (SR 30.4%) for an SP profit of £22.19 (ROI +48.2%). A/E index of 1.55; PRB figure of 0.58.

 

Hollie Doyle: Record by Trainer

Some punters love to follow certain trainer / jockey combinations and, although I don't generally, I think certain combos do produce some betting opportunities that represent value. Here are the trainers for whom Doyle has ridden at least 50 times (ordered by strike rate):

 

 

As you can see, Archie Watson provides Doyle with a high proportion of her rides. Although she has not made a profit on the 939 spins in that sample, she has done on his more fancied runners. To wit, horses priced 4/1 or shorter have provided the Doyle/Watson combination with 150 wins from 418 runners (SR 35.9%) showing a small SP profit of £14.07 (ROI +3.4%). To BSP this improves to +£40.68 (ROI +9.7%).

Her record with Alan King is excellent; not just because of the profit figure, but because the PRB is exceptionally high at 0.64. One other combo to mention is Hollie with the Gosden stable. The results are not in the table because they have only combined on 36 horses but, of these, 13 have won (SR 36.1%) for an excellent SP profit of £32.32 (ROI +89.8%). Where the Doyle/King PRB is impressive, the Doyle/Gosden figures trump them, standing at 0.69 (i.e. 69% of all rivals beaten). I think it would be worth keeping a close eye on the Gosden and King stables this season (and beyond), looking out for any Hollie Doyle booking.

 

Hollie Doyle: Record with Days since last run / horse layoff

A unique feature of the Profiler Tool (compared with the Query Tool) is the fact it gives you data for days since the horse last ran. Doyle’s figures are as follows:

 

 

As we can see Hollie has made a profit on horses whose last run was within a week of their prior start. As a general rule, my assumption, as with many others, has been that horses with shorter breaks outperform horses that are off the track for longer. This is the first time I have seen any PRB figures for any fitness based variable such as this. It is interesting, and pleasing to see the sliding scale from 0.61 down to 0.41. These findings give me the impetus to check PRB figures for a bigger group of runners to see if the same sliding scale is repeated. I am guessing it is – if so it might become the basis for an article in the future.

 

Hollie Doyle: Draw Awareness

Another first for me: this is the first time I have tried to drill down into this type of idea. Essentially punters, bookies, trainers and jockeys are aware of draw biases. Some will over- or under-estimate bias, but one would hope that seasoned jockeys understand the effect of the draw at most courses better than most. It is clearly a difficult area to research but I thought I had enough data for Hollie at one particular course, namely Kempton, to try to do this. My idea was simple: I wanted to compare her record in 8 or more runner handicaps at Kempton over 5f to 1 mile, with other jockeys, purely from a draw perspective. Kempton over these four distances (5f, 6f, 7f & 1m) offers a low draw edge and hence I wanted to compare Doyle’s record when drawn 1 to 4 (the best four draws) with all other jockeys. To do this, I decided to calculate the relevant PRB figures as these I would assume to be the most accurate, as they create bigger data sets than, say, using win and each way data.

Hollie had over 100 qualifying handicap rides when drawn in stalls 1 to 4 over these Kempton distances and her PRB figure was 0.60. The combined figure for all other jockeys is 0.55. This leads me to conclude, at least from these Kempton stats, that she has good draw awareness: she has performed notably above the norm when her horses have been well drawn at Kempton. I did check the non-handicap figures at Kempton using the same parameters – in these cases, she had fewer qualifying rides than in handicaps (44), but her PRB figure was a very impressive 0.63, the overall non handicap jockey figure stands at 0.53.

This is clearly a challenging area to research in great depth from an individual jockey perspective, due to small course and distance data sets. For example, you probably would not get enough individual data at Chester unless a jockey had ridden there regularly for 20 years or more, as that track does not host many meetings over a 12 month period. Kempton, however, has so many race meetings each year this is a course that lends itself to this avenue of research. Something else to maybe write about more in the future?

One further caveat worth mentioning with this type of research is the fact that there is some selection bias in the quality of top riders' mounts compared with the average.

 

Hollie Doyle: Record by Run Style

I mentioned earlier a recent article in which I touched upon Doyle’s positive record on front runners in handicaps at the sprint distances of 5f and 6f, but also at 7f and 1m. Well, Hollie's record from the front is actually extremely good across the board – handicaps / non-handicaps, and any distance. Yes, she has a higher strike rate on front runners running over shorter distances, but in all races of 1m1f or more her strike rate on these pace setters still hits just over 20% (A/E 1.10). This ranks her 9th out of all jockeys currently riding in the UK in terms of win strike rate (150 front running rides or more over 1m1f+ from 2015 to 2022), 12th if including Irish jockeys. In terms of A/E index she lies 11th (UK), 15th (UK and Ireland). For the record the average win strike for ALL jockeys over 1m1f+ stands at 15.6%.

Here is a breakdown of Hollie Doyle's run style performance across ALL races:

 

 

She has an excellent close to one win in four record with front runners, whereas with hold up horses this drops markedly to less than one win in every 12. The A/E figures correlate as the following chart shows:

 

 

As regular readers of my articles will know front runners have an edge at a majority of courses and distances, so the patterns seen for Doyle should come as no real surprise. That said, her figures are well above the norm over all distances, and if she is booked to ride a horse that often front runs, that ought to be seen as a double positive in cases where the pace map indicates an even tempo or, especially, Hollie's mount is the probable lone speed angle.

Before winding up the run style stats, let me share her record when riding the favourite:

 

 

More evidence, as if it was really needed, about the importance of early track position.

[As a side note, using favourite in run style analysis removes any selection bias regarding 'good horses at the front, bad ones at the back'. In spite of this levelling of the playing field, one invariably sees this type of strong front of field bias. Keep this in mind if you're currently backing plenty of fancied horses with a hold up run style!]

 

Some Extra Hollie Doyle Nuggets

With the main body of the article complete let me just share with you a few extra stats or nuggets that may be of interest:

  1. When Hollie retains the ride after winning last time, her record reads 67 wins from 310 (SR 21.6%). Backing all runner to BSP would have yielded a profit of £31.12 (ROI +10.0%).
  2. Horses that finished second last time have a good record with Doyle on board. Of the 585 qualifiers, 139 have won (SR 23.8%) for a BSP profit of £74.03 (ROI +12.7%).
  3. In very small fields (2 to 4 runners) Doyle has secured 54 wins from 142 rides (SR 38.0%) for a BSP profit of £65.27 (ROI +46.0%). She made significant profits if backing to Industry SP, too (+£53.79).
  4. In Class 1 races, Hollie has done well if the horse has been fancied (defined as priced 10/1 or shorter). 25 wins from 109 (SR 22.9%) for a BSP profit of £26.29 (ROI +24.1%).

 

Hollie Doyle Main Takeaways

  1. Doyle has been extremely consistent in the past four years and as I am penning this piece her strike rate for 2023 is above her norm at 15.8%.
  2. When riding more fancied runners (17/2 or less) Hollie has made a small profit to BSP, though that may be due to historical data so some caution is advised.
  3. She has an excellent record at both Yarmouth and Pontefract.
  4. Doyle should be noted when riding for Alan King or the Gosden stable and, also, when riding for Archie Watson look out for shorter priced horses (4/1 or less).
  5. If Hollie is on board a horse that had run in the past seven days it tends to be a positive.
  6. At Kempton in races of 1m or less when drawn 4 or lower she has performed well above the norm.
  7. Doyle is an excellent rider from the front at all distances.
  8. The four "extra nuggets" shared immediately above.

*

There are plenty of Hollie Doyle stats to get to grips with in the above: lots of positives, and the occasional negative, too. Hollie should continue to give us plenty of potential betting opportunities in the coming weeks, months and, I hope, years. I really rate her as one of the very best around and, more importantly, the stats tend to agree!

- DR

Jockeys and Run Style Revisited

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In this article I will be looking at my favourite area of research, namely running styles / pace, writes Dave Renham. As I have mentioned numerous times before, knowing how a race is likely to “pan out” in terms of a potential “pace angle” can give us an important edge.

Being able to predict the running style of each horse in a race can be liquid gold in certain circumstances but, as we know, in most cases this is trending towards the impossible. However, using past run style data we can make an informed judgement, and certain races will be easier to predict how things will pan out than others. In terms of past running style, arguably the most important factor is the horse itself, especially if it has a preferred pace position. However, there are other dynamics to consider, including the other horses in the race, the draw at certain tracks and over certain distances, the trainer, and the jockey.  And it is that last variable I'll be delving into for the remainder of the article.

A jockey can certainly make a big difference in any race, especially when it comes to pace or running styles. How often have you seen a jockey set a steady gallop in front and manage to repel all rivals for a pillar to post victory? Just the other day at Chester we saw a masterclass of that from Hollie Doyle, aboard Pride Of America in a 1m2f handicap (12/5/23). Hollie got to the front, dictated the tempo, and then cleverly kicked for home earlier than the other jockeys were expecting. She now had them all on the stretch and kicked three lengths clear around two furlongs out. The favourite gradually closed as they reached the final furlong and possibly got a neck in front with 150 yards to go. However, the energy it had used up to get back to Pride Of America meant he had nothing left for the finish and Doyle’s mount pulled away again for a classy success.

For this article I have looked at five years' worth of data (1/1/18 to 31/12/22) including both turf and all weather racing, but in the UK only (i.e. not Ireland). My focus has been on handicap races and I will start over the two sprint trips of 5 and 6 furlongs. Before I crack on, let me give you an overview of run style and what it means (regular readers will know this inside out by now I hope!).

The run style stats have been sourced from this website's data – specifically the Query Tool. The run style data here at Geegeez is split into four sections – Led (4), Prominent (3), Mid Division (2) and Held Up (1). The number in brackets is the run style score that is assigned to each section.

The numbers are really helpful as we can use them to drill down and build a better picture and understanding of how important run style can be.

Below is a basic breakdown of which type of horse fits which type of run style profile:

Led – horses that lead early, horses that dispute the early lead. I refer to the early leader as the front runner;

Prominent – horses that lie up close to the pace just behind the leader(s);

Mid Division – horses that race mid pack or just behind the mid-point;

Held up – horses that are held up at, or near the back of the field.

 

Jockeys in Sprint Handicaps (5f - 6f)

As a starting point let us see which jockeys took the early lead the most (in % terms) in sprint handicaps at up to six furlongs. I have included jockeys that have had at least 100 rides over this 5-year period and who are currently still riding in the UK – those with the highest 15 percentages are shown below:

 

 

For comparison purposes the average for ALL jockeys in terms of taking the early lead is 14.2%. Thus, Ross Coakley and Kieran O’Neill both go forward early nearly twice as often as the average. Now, a look at those jockeys that have the lowest percentages:

 

 

There are a couple of very well-known jockeys in this cohort: Ryan Moore and Jamie Spencer. Spencer is renowned for his hold up style as a jockey, so that should come as no surprise. However, Ryan Moore may raise more eyebrows, as less than 6% of his sprint handicap rides have seen him take the lead early. Moore-ridden sprint handicappers have been held up more than any of the other three run styles (mid division, prominent, led), but only 11.7% of them have won. Compare this to the combined figure of horses he's ridden prominently or led aboard which have won 22.2% of the time in the same group of races. Moore is a well-respected and successful jockey, but in sprint handicaps would I want him riding a horse I'm keen on? Probably not.

Jockeys who can get their mounts to front run more often than most in sprints are definitely worth noting, but one could (rightly) argue that the win percentages for jockeys when on front runners is more important. For example, if a jockey had taken the lead in 25% of races but won only 5% of them then this turns into a negative. In contrast, a jockey that has led early in say 15% of races but won 25% of the time when taking the early lead is definitely a positive. Of course, the ideal is to have a jockey that gets to the front early a high percentage of the time, and goes on to win a high percentage of the time!

Therefore, let us now look at the top performing jockeys in terms of win % when on a front runner (30 front running rides minimum):

 

 

For comparison purposes the average win SR% for ALL front running jockeys in handicap sprints stands at 18.1%. It's good to see Messrs Coakley, Hart, Callan and Bryan in this table – they were also in the top 15 of early leading jockeys shown earlier. Some of the datasets are quite small, so we do need to be aware of this but, when it comes to Jason Hart, we have plenty of evidence with which to work. Hence let's dig a little deeper into Hart's run style record in 5-6f handicaps.

Jason Hart's Run Style in Sprint Handicaps (up to 6f)

As we have seen Jason Hart front runs / leads early in roughly a quarter of all handicap sprints in which he rides. Of these 27.2% went on to win. These are impressive and powerful numbers and I am always on the look-out for which horse Hart is riding in such contests.

Look at Hart compared to the average jockey, in terms of run style: there are two columns in the graph below. The orange columns show what percentage of horses displayed that particular running/pace style for all the jockeys; this is our control group data if you like. The blue columns are the figures for Hart. So, for instance, leaders accounted for 14% of all runners when examining the ALL jockey data, whereas Hart led on 25.5% of his sprint handicap rides; prominent racers were 33.4% for all jockeys versus 39.9% for Hart, and so on.

 

 

The graph is useful as it is an easy way to compare the data. Jason Hart clearly understands the importance of track position in sprints: 65.4% of the time he either gets to, or is close to, the front early. This is far higher than the average figure for ALL jockeys which stands at 47.6%.

If we look at the win and place breakdown for Hart, we can really see the importance of track position:

 

 

As the table shows, if you had been able to back every front running sprinter Hart rode, you would have made a huge profit, not just if backing to win, but backing each way also. Not only that, we need also to remember these profit/loss figures are calculated to Industry SP. Just imagine the profits if backing on the exchanges or taking BOG! Prominent racers would have made us a profit if backing to win also. The stats/returns for midfield and hold up horses are poor for Hart in these quick fire events – but we know from previous research this is almost always the case regardless of rider or situation.

For the record Hart has taken 123 different horses to the front early in these races and, of those he has ridden from the front four times or more, 15 of the 16 won at least once. Indeed these 16 horses have combined to front run in 107 races of which they were successful on 40 occasions, which equates to a hugely impressive 37.4% strike rate.

There is one more Jason Hart stat to share which is his record on front runners in handicap sprints when his horse was in the top three of the betting: he has won on these horses a staggering 41.2% of the time with SP returns equating to 90p in the £. Looking at the ALL jockey figures for these fancied runners, the strike rate is just 29.2%.

Before moving on, Hollie Doyle is another jockey who has done well on similarly fancied runners, scoring over 38% of the time.

Jockeys in 7f & 1m Handicaps

Up in trip now. To start with I will look once again at which jockeys took the early lead most often (in % terms) in these races. As with the sprints I have included jockeys who had at least 100 rides over the 5-year period and who are currently still riding in the UK – those with the highest 15 percentages are shown below:

 

 

Theodore Ladd has staggering figures, taking his runners to the lead over a third of the time. Next highest is Frankie Dettori, albeit with a 12% lower figure.

It should be noted that front runners in handicaps are not as successful over 7f-1m compared with 5-6f but, generally, they do still have an edge, as the graph below shows:

 

 

As can be seen a front runner is twice as likely to win as any individual hold up horse. For the record, if we had been able to use our crystal ball to predict the front runner in every qualifying race we would have made a profit of £1954.92 to £1 level win stakes, equating to returns to Industry SP of over 22p in the £.

Time to see which jockeys have performed best from the front in terms of win strike rate (50 front running rides minimum / 7f-1m handicaps):

 

 

William Buick heads the list on 30% which is excellent. He also appeared in the best percentage table for 5-6f handicaps earlier; much of this will be down to the well-drilled Charlie Appleby horses on which he typically has first dibs. Hollie Doyle appears again also, as do Daniel Tudhope and Charles Bishop.

Data as we know can get skewed under certain circumstances, so I now want to examine jockey run style performance in these 7f-1m handicaps when the horses have come from the top three in the betting. This gives us a similar group of runners which renders jockey comparison arguably more effective. First let us breakdown overall win strike rates for all four run styles when the horses are in the top three in the betting:

 

 

Early leaders still enjoy a strong edge in this cohort of exclusively fancied runners. The overall strike rate for ALL runners from the top three in the betting stands at 20.3%, so these front runners score 35% more often than the average (27.4 / 20.3 = 1.35).

Let us review which jockeys have higher strike rates on top three in the betting front runners than the 27.4% average. In addition I will share the potential profit/loss figures should we have predicted the horse/jockey would get to the front early (40 qualifiers minimum):

 

 

Some impressive figures here – Buick is again prominent in the list with an excellent 43% win success, though Tom Marquand just pips him on 44.4%. Hollie Doyle has very good stats once more.

Run style/pace averages by jockey

In order to give us a more complete picture I have produced jockey run style/pace averages. I have used these averages in the past not just for jockeys, but courses and trainers as well. I simply add up the Geegeez pace points for a particular jockey and divide it by the number of rides; the higher the average the more prominent the jockey tends to race. It makes sense to split these pace averages up into 5-6f and 7f-1m handicap figures.

I have also highlighted jockeys with high run style/pace averages (in green) and low run style/pace averages (in red). The colour coding parameters for each distance are slightly different as the average run style figure for 5-6f handicaps is 2.28, for 7f-1m it is a little lower at 2.21.

 

 

As a rule of thumb I would prefer to have a jockey with a green figure if riding a horse I wanted to bet at these distances. I also would check their win strike rate as well because, as I mentioned earlier, this is clearly important in terms of avoiding losing runs.

Before winding this piece up, here is a race example of how we could have combined our knowledge of both horse and jockey pace/run styles. It is from March 16th of this year and it was a 5f handicap at Southwell. The racecard below has been ordered by horse pace totals (last four runs):

 

 

As we know 5f handicaps generally give front runners a healthy edge and, looking at the horse data above, it seemed likely that the early pace will come from either Ustath, Brandy Station or Dapper Man. If we now look at the jockey run style pace averages (5-6f handicaps 2018-2022) we see the following:

 

 

Jason Hart, who was mentioned earlier in the article, tops the list and hence a combination of Dapper Man’s 14 points and Jason Hart’s preference to push his mounts up to or near the front early, looked a good partnership. Ustath (16 points) was ridden by Jonny Peate, but his average was relatively modest at 2.19; Brandy Station (14 points) was ridden by Zak Wheatley who had a decent enough figure of 2.42. From these stats and using solely run style/pace to find a selection, you would say that Dapper Man and Jason Hart looked the most obvious option with Brandy Station another to consider.

As is inevitably the way with example races, things panned out much as expected from a run style perspective: Ustath and Brandy Station disputed the lead for the first furlong before Dapper Man who had been tracking them took over. He led for the rest of the race and won at 8/1.

Obviously, not all races will go to script like this, but doing our run style homework should give us an edge over those who ignore run style completely, or do not fully understand it; jockeys definitely have a part to play and we need to be aware of that.

There are many other factors to consider when analysing any race, but run style bias can be potent, especially over certain courses and distances. In some cases I would argue it is the most important thing to consider. I hope this piece has further sparked your interest and, if you have not really considered run style before, this should offer some food for thought. Until next time...

- DR

Run Style in Smaller Field Handicaps

/in /by

It is time for me to revisit one of my favourite areas of research, namely the run style of horses, writes Dave Renham. In case you didn't know, run style research is often linked with draw analysis, as one can positively impact the other depending on the course, distance and field size in question. For example, if we look at data from 2014 to 2022 for Chester handicap sprints (up to 6f) with 10+ runners, we can see that the highest third of the draw are at a disadvantage in terms of taking the early lead:

 

 

Of the 92 early pace runners, just 11 were horses from the top third of the draw. Working out the percentage chance of which third of the draw is most likely to lead given those raw figures are as follows:

 

 

So a horse from the top third of the draw manages to take the early lead just under 12% of the time. This equates to less than one race in every eight. Compare that to horses from the lowest third of the draw who are able to lead in more than half of all races. Why this happens is simply due to the nature of the Chester track. Horses drawn low are drawn on the inside nearest the rail, and at both sprint trips, as we can see from the racecourse map, the turning nature of the track means that if a horse can grab the rail they will be going the shortest route for well over half the race.

Horses drawn wide have a very difficult task therefore to get to the early lead in front of a lower drawn rival, especially so when all jockeys (and trainers) know the value of a forward position.

 

 

So, when combining draw and run style at Chester over sprint trips with 10+ runners, it should be noted that a low drawn early leader is a horse that has a better chance of winning than any other draw / run style combination. These horses have won 26% of the time going back to 2014, whereas high drawn held up horses have won 0% of the time (0 wins from 135).

Bigger field sizes in handicap sprints almost always strengthen any draw bias – I rarely concern myself with the draw in races with small fields, and all my draw research / article writing is based on field sizes of at least eight or more. Hence in big field handicap sprints at certain courses I will use draw and run style biases in conjunction with each other to look for potential betting opportunities. The Chester stats shared above are a good illustration why I do this. At this juncture, it is worth mentioning the blindingly obvious: I don’t ignore other race reading factors, I just perceive draw and run style as often the most useful.

However, in recent years, the average number of runners in handicap races has been dropping. This means that fewer races provide the opportunity to use draw and run style biases in tandem.

To illustrate the fact that smaller field races are becoming more prevalent, take a look at the table below. This illustrates the percentage of races that have taken place within different field size brackets in 5f handicaps, comparing the period from 2015 to 2018 data with the past two full seasons (2021-2022).

 

 

As you can see the very smallest fields (2 to 6 runners) have seen an increase from 18.7% to 21.3%; there is also an increase in the 7 to 9 runner bracket. In 10 to 12 runner races there has been a small decrease, but in 13+ runner races we can see a bigger reduction.

A similar pattern can be seen when we delve into 6f handicap data over the same two time frames:

 

 

Races of 2 to 6 runners occurred roughly one in every nine contests between 2015 and 2018, but this has increased to roughly once in every six races in the past two seasons. This is not ideal as races with fewer runners gives me less opportunity to potentially factor in draw bias. However, we have to move with the times, so in the remainder of this article I will look in more detail at small field sprint handicaps, honing in specifically on run style.

From extensive past research I know, and regular readers of my articles will know, that early leaders in handicap sprints tend to have a decent advantage over other run styles. At some courses the bias is stronger than others, and as a general rule front runners have more of an edge over five furlongs than six. As I mentioned earlier my draw based articles use eight runners as a minimum, so it makes sense therefore to concentrate here on races with seven or fewer runners. I have analysed data from the past seven full seasons in the UK (2016 to 2022) looking solely at 5f and 6f handicaps.

To start with let's look at the run style win strike rate splits for all 5f handicaps with 7 or fewer runners. I am splitting the results in the same way that Geegeez does, into four sections – Led (4), Prominent (3), Mid Division (2) and Held Up (1). The number in brackets is the run style score that is assigned to each section. These scores can be found in racecards, on the Pace Analyser tool and on the Query Tool on the site.

 

 

As we can see, early leaders / front runners (L) have a definite advantage over prominent racers who in turn have an advantage over horses that race in mid division or are held up. The A/E indices correlate too – A/E (Actual vs Expected) is an indicator of value where a figure of 1 or more is a positive:

 

 

Early leaders/front runners have an A/E index of 1.2 which is strong. Indeed, if your crystal ball for predicting the front runner in these 5f handicaps had been in tip top order, then backing all these runners would have yielded a profit of £346.62 to £1 level stakes giving returns of 22p for every £1 staked. That is at starting price, the figures to BSP are roughly double that.

This front running bias can also be seen when we look at the run style win strike rates for favourites:

 

 

Favourites that led early or raced prominently both made a profit to SP assuming we had been able to predict their running style pre-race. Mid-division favourites lost 11p in the £, with hold up jollies losing double that at 22p in the £.

A look at the official going now to see if that has any effect in small field 5f handicaps. Here are the stats for front runners / early leaders by going:

 

 

Other than on good to soft going the win strike rate has exceeded 20%. It seems that front runners have a decent edge regardless of ground conditions in small field five furlong sprint handicaps, with potential profits across the board and A/E indices of 1 or greater for all.

Jockey data for front runners in these races is a little limited (only four riders led early in 30 or more races). However, I do want to mention Jason Hart as he has won with 12 of his 30 front running rides (SR 40%). Hart's A/E index stands at an outstanding 2.48. On prominent runners he has a goodish record scoring just under 18%, but on mid div / hold up horses he managed just 1 win from 29 (SR 3.4%). Hart also has a very good record from the front in 5f handicaps with fields of eight or more runners (SR 29.9%), so he clearly is a good judge of pace when taking his horse to the front early. Hollie Doyle has a good record on these 5f early leaders, too, with 12 wins from 32 (SR 32.4%; A/E index 1.89).

Time to go up a furlong and look at the 6f handicap stats in races of 7 runners or less.

 

 

Front runners are once again clearly the most successful, but the other three groups are much more even than in their five furlong equivalents. Prominent racers are no longer in a clear second place over this extra furlong. Checking the A/E indices we see a correlation once again:

 

 

Early leaders / front runners hit an impressive 1.18, virtually the same as the 5f handicap figure of 1.20. The other three are fairly closely matched, as their win strike rates were.

Below is a bar chart showing the fate of 6f handicap favourites in small fields by run style.

 

 

The front running bias remains when focusing on favourites only, with over 40% of front running favourites winning, and they would have been profitable, too. The other three groups would have yielded loses.

A look at the going now. Over 5f the figures for front runners / early leaders were relatively even and positive across the board. What about at three-quarters of a mile?

 

 

Once more, we see positive figures across the board with strike rates all above 20% and A/E indices all above 1.10. It should be noted that for both five- and six-furlong handicaps the 'soft or heavy' A/E index was the highest as was the win strike rate. Maybe the front running bias is slightly stronger on soft and heavy ground but I would personally need more evidence to be confident of this.

A quick mention of jockeys: I noted earlier that Hollie Doyle had decent figures on 5f front runners, and she has a similar record over this extra furlong with 14 wins from 38 rides (SR 36.8%; A/E index 2.19). She must be a very good judge of pace in small field sprint handicaps.

Before I close, allow me to share some front running data for trainers. I have combined 5f and 6f handicaps to give us bigger samples (45 runs+ qualify, ordered by strike rate):

 

 

Some impressive figures here especially for Archie Watson, Kevin Ryan and Tom Dascombe. Indeed, 13 of Watson’s 25 winners were ridden by Hollie Doyle and this trainer/jockey combo scored 43% of the time with front runners.

 

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

It is clear that even in smaller field handicaps over 5 or 6 furlongs, horses that grab the early lead have a definite advantage. Over 5f the bias is stronger, but the edge over six is still playable. The age old problem is being able to predict the early leader before the start of the race. From previous articles that I have written on this site, we have seen that the run style / pace scores found in the racecards are a definite help. Horses with the highest last four run pace totals do lead more often than those with lower pace totals.

Before I finish, here is an example of a six-runner handicap from earlier this year, so not a race within this article's sample data, where the last four pace totals seemed to indicate a very strong candidate for a horse that would lead early:

 

 

Bare Necessity had led in three of his previous four runs and had a four-point advantage over the second highest pace scoring horse, and he had the inside stall. Not only that, of the 20 runs of the other horses combined, just one of these races had seen a horse take the early lead. Now we can never be certain pre-race that a horse will lead, but this is about as good as it gets. As it turns out Bare Necessity did lead early and made all the running to win:

 

 

As I am sure you will agree, 28/1 winners are not to be sniffed at! It goes without saying that races do not always pan out perfectly like this, but ultimately if you could predict the front runner most of the time in such races, you would not really need to do much else: no need to check the form, whether the horse goes on the ground, how fit is the horse, etc, etc. Maybe we should have a challenge for members – to find a method to predict the highest percentage of front runners. I’m in!

- DR

Dave Renham: A Window into My World of Racing Research, Part 2

/in /by

On January 25th of this year I wrote a detailed piece which I hope gave readers an understanding of how much work can go into researching horse racing ideas when some, or all, of your research requires a race by race approach, writes Dave Renham. This was the only method of research in the old days before computers and racing databases, and this is what I primarily did going back to the early 1990s.

Of course, nowadays 99% of my articles are sourced by solely using databases such as the Geegeez Query tool, the Geegeez Draw Analyser, etc. However, there have always been significant advantages to this old fashioned slow data collection method, primarily because you do get a proper ‘feel’ and understanding for the data you are collating. You can see patterns that might be missed if simply pressing a button and just getting the raw stats breakdown. The downside is obviously the time it takes to go through race by race.

In my first piece I looked at a specific group of races – these were all-weather handicap races run around a bend with eight runners, over the sprint trips of 5f and 6f. I looked at data for four seasons which equated to 190 races. I chose the sprints simply because I have always been a fan of handicap sprints and most of my bets occur in such races. I looked at the effect of the draw, running style/pace data, market factors and Peter May speed ratings. The key findings from this research were:

  1. As a general rule, on turning sprint tracks a lower draw is preferable due to its position closest to the inside rail;
  1. The top three in the betting combined broke even to BSP;
  1. Horses with higher Geegeez pace/running style total scores based on their last four runs win more often than those with lower totals;
  1. Horses from the top three of the speed ratings scored much more often than those fourth to eighth, although profits/losses between the two groups were similar.

 

You can review that article here.

 

So what have I looked at this time? Well, I've started with a similar group of races to before, only this time I have focused on UK 5f handicaps only, on the turf. I did exclude 2yo nursery handicaps as such races have more limited past data. I expanded the field size to include races between 8 and 11 runners, while keeping the same four year time frame (2019 to 2022). This gave me a much larger number of races to research – just under 540 in fact. With a greater data set to examine I hoped that it may lead to some angles that we can use to our advantage in the future.

At this point I should add that there was a small tweak in terms of what I focused on compared with the original article. I did not examine the draw this time, because of the different nature of the various five-furlong course constitutions. There are some straight 5f tracks, some round ones, and also there can be different stall positioning on some straight tracks. All this means there is no uniformity so it made sense to focus on other things. Hence, for this research I not only collated the Peter May ratings again, but I also added the Topspeed speed ratings as well; and I looked at the Geegeez pace/running style data from the past four races, as I did last time. Market rank was also once again looked at.

Now, I could not have done this much research by simply pulling out each race result, then writing each horse, course, finishing position etc into a spreadsheet. That would have meant manually typing in 16 distinct columns of data for 4953 rows of individual runners. I mean, I like my research, but 79,248 cells to type a number or word into is too much even for me! I’m all for finding racing angles that others don’t, but personally typing numbers and words into nearly 80,000 cells would be a tad crazy!!

Instead, I used two databases, one being the Geegeez Query Tool, in order to get most of the columns into the spreadsheet far more speedily. This gave me my starting point as 12 of the 16 columns were done, but there were four missing that I needed to add individually - these being the specific run style (pace) data, market rank and both sets of Speed Rating data. Now market rank was relatively ‘easy’ to add using some excel tricks, but it did leave me the run style (pace) data and speed rating positions to add manually.

As you can imagine, manually adding run style and speed ratings data race by race for over 500 races took some time – a lot of man hours. Thus, for both sets of speed ratings and the pace/run style scores, I decided to add the top three ‘rated’ horses only to the spreadsheet. If I had manually added every single ranking position to those columns the research would have taken twice as long, maybe longer.

Having set the scene it’s almost time to dig down and share what I found, but first I want to show you where you can find the relevant data on Geegeez.

In terms of speed ratings you can go to the ‘CARD’ tab on a specific race and you will see the Topspeed figure for each runner (column headed TS) and the Peter May Rating (column headed SR). The 2022 race from Chester (below) was one of the races in the 537 race sample:

 

 

Once I scrolled to this page I could sort the columns to display the horses that were in the top three of each rating column (e.g. the highest three figures). In the example above I have ordered the Peter May figures (highest at the top). We can see that Le Beau Garcon had the highest speed fig (81), So Smart had the second highest (67) with Riversway third (65). Once a race was sorted like this I labelled the three horses 1, 2, 3 on my spreadsheet. I then sorted the Topspeed ratings and repeated the process.

For the run style / pace data I wanted to find the top three horses in terms of their pre-race Geegeez run style/pace total from their previous four runs. To find what I needed I clicked on a race result, and once the result came up I then clicked on the ‘PACE’ tab. From there I ordered them with highest totals first – an example of what I mean is shown below from a 5f handicap at Catterick in 2021:

 

 

Here, Autumn Flight was top ‘pace’ rated with 15, Major Jumbo second on 14 and Militia third on 13 and, as with the speed ratings, I labelled the three horses 1, 2, 3 on my spreadsheet. Now, occasionally you will see a horse that had a ‘U’ rather than a number in one of the last four race columns. This occurs occasionally when it is unclear from the in-running comments what pace number should be assigned to that specific run. For these horses I double checked different sources, or even watched the start of the relevant race so that I could add the right figure. I would then recalculate those specific horses’ total.

It should also be stressed that there are times when you get horses with identical four race pace totals, which means it is potentially difficult to get an exact ‘top three’. In the event of tied four race totals, I look at the most recent race first (LR column) and compared the horses who have tied. The horse with the highest figure in that first column would take priority. If the scores are the same for the LR, I would then compare the next column (2LR) and keep going until one out scored the other. Here is an example of such a case:

 

 

This Thirsk race saw three horses tie for second with 12 pace points each. However, if we compare the LR column we see Spanish Angel scored 4, Boudica Bay 3 and Dandy Spirit 1. For this race Spanish Angel was placed second behind Birkenhead, and Boudica Bay third in terms of their run style/pace position.

OK, it is time to share my findings...

 

Topspeed Ratings

Starting with the Racing Post Topspeed figures, and comparing win strike rates.

 

 

In truth, it was a little disappointing to see a relatively even split. OK, the 4th+ speed rated horses did have the lowest strike rate, but I had expected / hoped their strike rate figure would have been lower. Not only that, the 4th+ rated horses actually turned a very small profit to BSP.

 

Peter May Ratings

Let us now look at the performance of the Peter May (SR) Ratings – again comparing the top rated, 2nd rated, 3rd rated and combining those rated 4th or lower:

 

 

This is a more encouraging picture – in terms of win success at least. There is a clear drop off when we look at the horses with a speed rating position of 4th or lower. In terms of returns, the 2nd top rated horse made a profit of around 9p in the £ to BSP if backing every single one ‘blind’.

 

BSP Market Rank

Let's look at market rank now. I was able to rank all horses, not just the top three and here are the strike rate splits:

 

 

We can see a familiar sliding scale here: favourites winning close to 30% of the time, whereas outsiders ranked 6th or lower in the betting market combined to score just under 5.5% of the time. Favourites would have almost broken even with a loss to BSP of just 2p in the £; while second favourites got closer still, losing just a penny in the £.

 

Run style / pace

This is my favourite area of research, especially in sprints, because in general, there is a strong front-running bias in shorter distance handicaps such as these. Therefore I was hoping for some relatively positive stats. Here is the breakdown for the top three Geegeez pace/run style rated horses, as well as the combined results for horses rated 4th or lower:

 

 

In general these figures are encouraging, especially when we look at the profit/loss column. The top three rated horses have combined to be far better value than those rated 4th or lower. The strike rates are much closer, although the top rated runners have secured the highest win rate.

When we dig a bit deeper, it is worth noting that the profit and loss figures are not skewed due to the higher rated pace horses having more big-priced winners. In fact, if comparing the odds of the ten highest priced winners from the top rated pace group against the fourth or lower group, we see the following:

 

 

Clearly, the lower rated pace / run style runners have had bigger priced winners overall. The average BSP price for these ten runners for 4th+ rated is 51.68; for the top rated it is 33.45.

I have mentioned numerous times in previous articles how important it is to look deeper into profit and loss figures. You need to make sure the bottom line is not giving a false impression.

I want next to look at a couple of angles concentrating solely on the top rated pace/run style runners. Firstly a look at the yearly breakdown:

 

 

It is very promising to see that three of the four years turned a profit to BSP. The strike rate in 2019 was a fair bit lower, but when horses win on average 12.9% of the time, it is not unusual to see a 10% strike rate over 150 races.

Now I am splitting the top rated pace/run style results by number of race runners:

 

 

Obviously, ignore the diminishing strike rates as field size grows: that is to be expected as it is easier to beat seven rivals in an 8 runner race than it is to beat ten rivals in an 11 runner race. Again, three of the four sections have produced positive returns and the other broke even.

The final area I wanted to look at was combining ratings with the Geegeez pace/run style ratings. So, firstly, how did horses do if they were in the top three of all three? That is, they were one of the three highest Topspeed ratings, one of the top three in the Peter May ratings and one of the top three in the four-race Geegeez pace/run style totals. Well, 316 horses qualified, of which 51 won (SR 16.1%) showing a small profit of £26.96 (ROI +8.5%). This was encouraging.

Let me compare these results to horses that were not in the top three of any of the Topspeed, Peter May and pace ratings. There were of course far more qualifiers – 1775 to be precise. 161 of these won, equating to strike rate of 9.1%, which is quite a difference. However, those lower-rated qualifiers made a slightly larger absolute profit of £50.09, but with a smaller ROI of just 2.8%.

This feels positive overall, especially the strike rate difference (16.1% versus 9.1%). While both groups turned a small profit, when I again dug deeper and looked into the biggest winning prices for each group, we can see the variance in their five highest winning priced runners:

 

 

Looking at this clearly demonstrates that horses that are rated in the top three positions of all three - Topspeed, Peter May and Pace ratings - are far better value - and less susceptible to skewing - than horses that lie 4th rated or worse in all three of the ratings.

Before I finish, I guess you may be wondering how horses that were top rated in all three ratings got on? Well, the problem here is number of qualifiers – there were only 24 runners that ticked all boxes over this four year period. Having said that 10 did win (SR 41.7%) for a BSP profit of £34.44 (ROI +143.50). Now whether these runners will continue to perform as well in the future is difficult to say as 24 runners is such a small sample. However, I personally will be keeping an eye for them. [Stop press: since researching this piece, Rajmeister was a 10/3 winner for this angle on the 22nd April]

 

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

Well, this has been quite a journey for me and a long one at that. Having to go through race by race is hard work, but ultimately I think the research uncovered some interesting findings. Not only that, it has inspired me to do some more digging around these themes, albeit it will no doubt be a rather slow excavation!

Before I finish I should mention that all BSP profits and losses have taken a 5% commission into account, as that gives the truest reflection of real life returns using that medium. Many punters are now paying only 2% commission, so if that's you, you can mark up the profits published above accordingly.

I hope you have enjoyed this journey and I hope it shows the usefulness/importance of some of the Geegeez data you can get from each racecard. I’ll be back next week looking at run style in smaller field handicaps. Until then...

- DR

Two-Year-Old Runners on 2nd Start: Part 2

/in /by

This is the second of two articles looking at two-year-old runners (2yos) on their second career starts. The first piece looked at last time out (LTO) performance, LTO course, market factors, sires, damsires and some jockey stats. You can read that here. This one focuses exclusively on trainer data. I have collated stats from UK flat racing for six full years, from 2017 to 2022, and this includes both turf and all weather data. I have calculated profit and loss to Betfair SP (BSP for short), with commission of 5% taken into account.

Overall 2yo second run stats for trainers

I am going to start with a full table with all trainers who have had at least 100 two-year old second starters in the past six seasons. I have ordered the trainers by win strike rate:

 

* C Johnston in 2023; ** Jack Channon in 2023

 

A familiar face heads the list – Charlie Appleby. His 37%-plus strike rate is remarkable but, despite that whopping win percentage, he has failed to make it into blind profit. This is, naturally, because many of his runners start at short prices. Seven other trainers have secured strike rates of 20% or higher with juvenile runners making their second career starts, which again is extremely noteworthy. Just one of these seven in profit though: Hugo Palmer.

In terms of A/E indices Messrs. Palmer, Dods, Dalgleish, Osborne and Tinkler are above the magic 1.00, although Nigel Tinkler, with a strike rate of under 5%, is not a trainer for the faint of heart to follow.

At this juncture it makes sense to compare the performance of trainers' 2yo debut runners with their 2yos having a second run. In the following table I have broken this down by strike rates and A/E indices for each trainer. I have ordered them by trainers who have seen the most improvement in strike rate from first to second start:

 

 

In the final column I have divided the second run win percentage by the debut one to give us a type of Impact Value. I call it a Comparison Strike Rate (CSR) and I also used this idea in the previous article when comparing sire stats. The higher this figure the more improvement the runners show on their second run compared to their debut. I have highlighted any CSR figure of 2.00 or more in green as these are much higher than the average. The CSR figure to bear in mind is 1.52. This is the average CSR figure when looking at the strike rate comparison for second starters compared with debutants; that is, on average a two-year-old is 1.52 times more likely to win on its second start compared with its debut (7.96% vs 12.08% in case you were curious).

Ed Dunlop has a very high CSR figure but that is because his debut runners having won less than 0.6% of the time. His second starters still only win on average once in every 15 or 16 races. Ed Walker, Michael Dods, William Haggas, Hugo Palmer, Charlie Hills, Sir Michael Stoute and Andrew Balding are the group of trainers who I would be expecting to see excellent improvement between first and second runs. Some of their runners should offer us decent value.

Brian Meehan is one specific trainer whose second starters look poor value, especially when comparing the stats to his debut runners. With debutants his A/E index stands at an impressive 1.36, for second starters this drops markedly to 0.76. Eve Johnson Houghton has a similar slide (1.38 to 0.79) which is also worth noting. Ths is essentially saying that Brian and Eve have their two-year-olds ready to fire on day one, which in itself is well worth noting.

 

Distance breakdown: trainer performance in 5f and 6f races

I want to split the trainer data by distance now and for this piece I am combining the sprint distances of 5 and 6f, and then will be looking at races of 7f or further. This is because it gives better sized data sets. So, to start, here are the win strike rates for trainers who have had at least 75 two-year-old second starters over 5f / 6f. I have split the data into two graphs – the first with strike rates of 16% or more:

 

 

William Haggas stands head and shoulders above the rest in terms of win record. He also has an A/E index in excess of 1.00 (1.09), as do three others - Michael Dods (1.24), Andrew Balding (1.15) and Clive Cox (1.02). For the record these three have made decent profits to BSP, while Haggas would have just about broken even. Of the remaining trainers, all made a loss bar Tom Dascombe, who made a small profit. Dascombe will be interesting to follow this year in his second season after the move from Cheshire to Lambourn and without the support of Chasemore Farm.

Now for those with strike rates under 16%:

 

 

There are still some relatively decent strike rates here as well, on the left-hand part of the graph at least, although only Keith Dalgleish managed a BSP profit. No trainer in this group had an A/E index of 1.00 or more and, for the record, Richard Hughes and Tim Easterby had the poorest A/E indices (0.64 and 0.54 respectively) with both making significant losses.

 

Distance breakdown: trainer performance in races of 7f or further

There are 10 trainers who have secured a strike rate of 16% or more in these longer distance races:

 

 

Charlie Appleby strikes at a preposterous close to 40% and backing his runners would have seen you break even to BSP. Here are these trainers' A/E indices which give us a better indication of overall value:

 

 

Hugo Palmer, Archie Watson and the Charlton stable have figures above 1.00 and they are trainers who, over 7f or more, I think we should keep on the right side (more often than not).

At the other end of the scale, these are the trainers with lower strike rates over 7f+. As there are quite a few I’ve put their results in tabular form rather than in a graph.

 

 

Andrew Balding’s bottom line looks impressive but he had a 232.24 BSP winner in 2020 which accounts for most of his profit. Having said that, even without that outlier, Balding still made a positive return. The three trainers at the bottom – Richard Fahey, Sir Mark Prescott and Tim Easterby - are trainers I think should be swerved with 2yo runners at 7f or beyond when making their second start.

Before moving on there are a few points worth making.

Firstly, Clive Cox has a vastly contrasting distance record: over sprint distances his second starter strike rate is 21.9%, over 7f+ it is just 8.8%. A/E indices also have a chasm between them at 1.02 vs 0.60.

Secondly, Richard Fahey has a similar bent to his stats with much better sprint results: strike rates of 15.6% compared to 6.9%; A/E indices of 0.88 to 0.59.

And third, Roger Varian’s stats are somewhat remarkable from the point of view that his strike rate has been exactly 20% for both distance groups and his A/E indices are almost identical, too, at 0.67 and 0.68.

 

Market breakdown: trainer performance with top three in the betting

As we know, profit figures can be easily skewed by big priced winners. Hence it makes sense to analyse trainer data where it is a more level playing field – or at least where we can perform a fair price comparison. Here are the data for trainers when their 2yo second starters have figured in the top three of the betting. A minimum of 75 runs has been used as the cut-off point:

 

 

It seems right that Charlie Appleby hits a small profit considering his overall figures.

Any trainer with an A/E index of 0.90 or more I feel can be considered much more a positive than negative when it comes to their more fancied runners. Ten trainers have achieved that, of which six have edged into profit. These are Charlie Appleby, the Johnston yard, Archie Watson, Team Crisford, Hugo Palmer and Tom Dascombe. The other four - William Haggas, Charlie Hills, Clive Cox and Richard Fahey - made losses and only Cox had losses of worse than 7 pence in the £.

On the other side of the coin, Saeed bin Suroor’s record is surprisingly poor with qualifiers from the top three in the betting – a win rate of roughly one in six, but losses close to 30p in the £ and a very poor A/E index of 0.56.

So far in this article I have looked at more general trainer stats – but now I want to focus in on a few specific trainers starting, not surprisingly, with Charlie Appleby.

 

Individual Trainers with Second Start Two-Year-Olds

Charlie Appleby

We have seen already that Charlie Appleby has an impressive overall strike rate, but this does not mean he is a money making machine for punters. If only it was that simple! Strike rate is important but betting is essentially about getting a value price - having 50% of winners at 10/11 keeps you in the game but loses you money, whereas 15% of winners at 8/1 means long losing runs but wins you money. Such is the challenge for us punters: winners, or profit?

From my personal experience it is harder to find value with short prices and this is why one cannot just blindly back Appleby runners, or indeed almost any other short-priced 'no brainer' angle. This is perhaps neatly illustrated when we breakdown Appleby’s profit with horses from the top three in the betting. As the previous table showed, these runners did make a small 5p in the £ profit for him. However, all the profits came from horses second and third in the betting. These combined to produce returns of just under 26p in the £, whereas favourites lost just over 4p in the £.

I have dug deeper into the Appleby stats and one angle that does stand out is jockey based. I touched upon jockeys in the first of these articles when I compared second starters that were ridden by the same jockey who had ridden them on debut, with those who have seen their jockey change. As a general rule I found that horses ridden by the same jockey outperformed those which were not. For Appleby this bias is pronounced as the table shows:

 

 

William Buick has been responsible for 72 of these 103 ‘same jockey’ runners. His strike rate was 45.8% and backing these runners would have returned you £16.06 (ROI +22.3%). James Doyle has had an even better strike rate albeit from a much smaller group of runners. He had a success rate of 52.2% (12 win from 23) for returns of 19p in the £. Hence any 2yo second starter from the Appleby yard who is ridden for the second time by either Buick or Doyle is a horse that potentially offers some value.

We have seen good consistency before with Appleby runners and his second starters seem no exception. They have proved versatile by going / ground conditions as the graph below shows:

 

 

All the strike rates are above 30%; it should be noted that the highest one (tapeta) is from a small sample (7 wins from 15) so this may be artificially high.

Here are some additional Charlie Appleby stats, both positive and negative:

  1. Appleby 2yo debut winners have a relatively modest record when running for the second time. They have backed up this win just 14 times from 60 (SR 23.3%) for a loss of £25.02 (ROI -41.7%).
  1. The value in terms of debut performance has come from horses that finished 5th or worse on debut. On second starts Appleby has secured 19 winners with these runners from 58 (SR 32.8%) for a profit of £10.59 (ROI +18.3%).
  1. At the highest level (Class 1 races) Appleby's runners on second start have won just 7 from 41 (SR 17.1%) for a loss of £18.07 (ROI -44.1%).
  1. Second time runners returning to the course where they debuted have done well, scoring nearly 50% of the time. 16 wins from 33 (SR 48.5%) have created a BSP profit of £17.36 (ROI 52.6%).
  1. Appleby has done well when sending second starting 2yos to Newmarket. He has been rewarded with 24 wins from 53 (SR 45.3%) for a healthy profit of £19.48 (ROI +36.8%).

 

Richard Hannon

I have chosen Richard Hannon next as he has had the biggest number of second starters in the past six seasons.

The eagle eyed of you would have seen already that his record in sprint events is better than 7f+ races; specifically, he has a strike rate of 17.3% for sprints compared to 10.6% for longer races. Here are some other Hannon second starter stats I would like to share.

  1. Just like Appleby, having the same jockey on board that rode the horse on debut has been a plus. These horses have won 37 of their 224 starts (SR 16.5%) for a small profit of £11.29 (ROI of 5.0%); the record of horses with new / different jockeys is 53 wins from 450 (SR 11.8%) for a loss of £73.50 (ROI -16.3%).
  1. 2yos returning to the track within two weeks of their debut have a surprisingly good record. 40 have won from 244 (SR 16.4%) for a healthy profit of £90.27 (ROI +37.0%). Amazingly, Hannon has made a profit with these runners in five of the six years which shows good consistency.
  1. Horses that finished first or second on debut have a good record with 26.1% of them winning on their second starts (35 wins from 135) for a profit of £40.06 (ROI +29.9%).
  1. Hannon has scored nearly 41% of the time with second time starter favourites, making the smallest of profits, £1.93 (ROI 1.8%).

 

Richard Fahey

Another Richard and another trainer who has had a decent number of runners. His overall strike rate with second starters stands at just under 13% and I have found a handful of useful stats – positive, negative and neutral.

  1. Clear favourites for Fahey have secured 33 wins from 73 2yo second starters (SR 45.2%) for a profit of £11.68 (ROI +16.0%).
  1. 2yos that won on debut have proved profitable on their second starts thanks to a strike rate of 17.9% producing returns of 56p in the £.
  1. Second starters who race at Beverley have scored 26.5% of the time (13 wins from 49) for a break even scenario.
  1. Having the same jockey on board as on debut has once again seen a big difference in performance, just as we saw with Appleby and Hannon runners. Fahey horses retaining the same jockey for the second run have won 19.8% of races (A/E index 1.06); those horses whose jockey has changed have won just 8.4% of their races (A/E index 0.60).
  1. Second starters racing on all weather tracks have a poor record with only 7 wins from 104 (SR 6.7%). Losses have been steep at 54p lost for every £1 staked.
  1. 2yos that have had their second start in September or later in the year look worth avoiding. Just 11 wins from 153 (SR 7.2%) for a loss of £67.11 (ROI -43.9%). For the record, if the horse was not favourite or second favourite Fahey saw just 3 wins from 121 runners.

 

Other trainers

Here are some individual stats that I have unearthed related to other trainers:

  1. Andrew Balding has an excellent record with horses that finished 1st, 2nd or 3rd on debut. On their second starts they have gone onto win 25 times from 89 (SR 28.1%) for a profit of £31.68 (ROI +35.6%). Balding has secured profits with these runners in four of the six years.
  1. Kevin Ryan has reverse stats compared to Balding. Horses that finished in the first three on debut would have lost a whopping 46p in the £ if backed blindly on second start.
  1. Sir Mark Prescott has sent 99 2yo second starters to all weather tracks, and only one has managed to win.
  1. Tim Easterby has a dreadful record with horses running again within two weeks of their debut, with just one win from 104 runners.
  1. William Haggas has a good record with 2yos that have dropped in class since their debut. He has secured a 34.2% strike rate thanks to 26 winners from 76. These runners have returned a profit of £9.84 (ROI +12.9%).
  1. Karl Burke is another trainer that does particularly well when retaining the same jockey who rode on debut – 36 wins from 150 rides (SR 24%) for a profit of £45.34 (ROI +30.2%).

 

MAIN TAKEAWAYS

Below is a summary of my main takeaways from this article; but there may be stats above that are far more important to you, so keep that in mind!

  1. Ed Walker, Michael Dods, William Haggas, Hugo Palmer, Charlie Hills, Sir Michael Stoute and Andrew Balding all enjoy much higher strike rates on second starts compared to debut runs.
  1. Brian Meehan and Eve Johnson Houghton are two trainers whose second starting 2yos offer relatively poor value, especially when comparing second runs to debuts.
  1. William Haggas, Michael Dods, Andrew Balding and Clive Cox have good records with 2yo second runs in 5-6f races. In contrast, Tim Easterby looks a trainer to avoid.
  1. Hugo Palmer, Archie Watson and the Charlton stable do well in races of 7f or more with their second starters.
  1. Charlie Appleby, the Johnston stable, Archie Watson, the Crisford stable, Hugo Palmer and Tom Dascombe have good records with second starters when in the top three in the betting. Saeed bin Suroor has a particularly poor record with these fancied runners.
  1. Charlie Appleby runners have a very good record when the same jockey who rode on debut rides on the second start. In particular, look out for William Buick and James Doyle. Appleby also does well with horses that finished out of the first four on debut, as well as horses that ran at Newmarket.
  1. Richard Hannon does well with horses that return to the track within two weeks of their debut. He also does well with debutants that won or finished second on debut.
  1. Richard Fahey second starters that start clear favourite have a strong record. On the negative side, avoid second starters if racing on the all weather, or if racing after August.

 

There is a fair bit to get your teeth into in this article and hopefully it has started to point you in the right direction, as well as steering away from some treacherous paths. For those readers who do not generally bet in 2yo races, I hope this, and the previous three articles, may have changed your mind.

- DR

Two-Year-Old Runners on 2nd Start: Part 1

/in /by

Having delved into two-year-old (2yo) debut data in my two previous articles (part 1 here and part 2 here), it is time to move on to 2yos on their second starts, writes Dave Renham. I will split the research up once more into two distinct pieces: this first one will look at a variety factors such as LTO (last time out) performance, LTO course, market factors, etc. The second will be drilling into numerous trainer based angles.

Once more I have researched UK flat racing results for six full years, from 2017 to 2022, and this includes both turf races as well as all-weather. I have calculated profit and loss to Betfair SP (BSP) with commission of 5% taken into account.

Firstly let me compare the win strike rates and the win and placed (each way) strike rates for 2yo debutants versus 2yo second starters:

 

 

As you can see, having that racecourse experience makes a significant difference, both in term of winning chances and placed ones too.

These strike rates are similar year in, year out for second time starting 2yos – the graph below shows this clearly with two virtually straight lines:

 

 

Of course the betting market takes these percentages into account when setting the prices so, although second time out juveniles win more than debutants do, it does not mean they are necessarily more profitable. Let us then examine the performance of 2yo second starters by price.

 

Market Factors

The prices shown in the table below are Industry SPs just because they fit to a more uniform price pattern – profits / losses / returns, however, are presented to BSP as previously started:

 

 

From these figures we can see that the shorter priced runners have been quite poor value, specifically those priced 9/4 or shorter. The biggest profits have come from the 25/1 or bigger runners but take out one winner at a BSP of 560.0 and suddenly we see a 100 point deficit. Add into the mix that there were three more winners priced between 300.0 and 500.0 (396.7, 312.79 & 485.27), as well as a miserly 1% strike rate, and we can see that backing such runners is not a sensible option, even if you are patient enough to wait on average for that one win in 91.

 

LTO position (finishing position on debut)

This was not an option to check with debutants (for obvious reasons), but for second starters it is an area we can dive into.

 

 

The first thing to note is that horses that came second on debut actually have a better strike rate than those who won on debut. This is not usually the case – looking at ALL races over the past six seasons (any age group / race type), the strike rate for all LTO winners is slightly higher than for all LTO runners up. Here there is a 7% differential, which may be down to the weight penalty most winners are obliged to carry next time. Having said that, the returns are virtually identical – within one hundredth of a pence per every £1 staked.

The value seems to have been with those horses that finished 5th or worse. Again, though, we need to be aware that those four huge priced winners mentioned earlier all came from runners who finished 5th or worse.

 

LTO course (course they made their debut)

Focusing on the course where a 2yo made its debut. what difference does this make? I have included all LTO courses that have had at least 80 qualifiers. That means just two courses miss out: Epsom and Wetherby. Courses are initially listed alphabetically and I have split Newmarket into results for both the Rowley course and the July one:

 

 

As we can see there is quite a mixed bag in terms of strike rates, returns and A/E indices. In general, I think that the strike rates and A/E indices are more significant than profit/loss, as some course data will have been skewed by very big priced winners. Also I would urge punters to be equally aware of the poorer performing LTO courses. Juveniles which had debut runs at Bath, Beverley, Brighton and Chester look horses to avoid on second starts in general terms; not only do they have poor strike rates, their A/E indices are under 0.70.

There is a significant difference however, when we compare LTO turf courses with LTO AW courses:

 

 

That better than 3% differential in strike rates with 2yo debutants coming from turf courses last time out equates to a 32% relative improvement over those returning after a debut on the all-weather. Likewise, the profit and loss figures to BSP (£1 level stakes) are similarly different:

 

 

All in all, one would prefer to be backing a 2yo on second career run that raced on the turf on its debut, rather than the sand.

If we break the data down further, by looking at horses that started in the top three of the betting on their second start, the LTO course surface made a difference there as well. These more fancied runners scored 26.2% of the time if their debut run was on turf, compared to 23.2% if their debut run was on the all weather.

A debut run at Newmarket has often been considered a positive and we can see the table shows debuts at both the Rowley and July courses have produced high second time out strike rates and good returns to boot. In addition the win percentage / strike rate has been consistently good year on year as the graph shows:

 

 

Three of the six years would have produced a blind profit to BSP, and at this juncture I would like to share more specific data looking at the horses that finished 2nd or 3rd at Newmarket on debut. These runners have secured a one in three win ratio (SR 33.5%) and a small level stakes profit of £18.09 (ROI +7.7%) on their next starts. However, the most remarkable thing is that despite this modest profit, five of the six years have been winning ones:

 

 

It is clear that any horse which finished 2nd or 3rd on debut at Newmarket is worth looking at in some detail on their next outing. In fact all horses that debuted at Newmarket should be looked at as possible betting opportunities especially if other factors offer positive vibes.

 

Sires

Onto sires next, and here is a table of all sires with at least 100 offspring to have had two (or more) runs as two-year-olds. I have ordered them by strike rate:

 

 

There is quite a difference when comparing the likes of Dubawi at the top, with his better than one win in four ratio, and Heeraat at the bottom, whose record is roughly one win in every 50!

Now, in the previous article I looked at sire stats for 2yo debutants so it makes sense to compare the individual sires and their debut and second run stats; here, I will be comparing the 2yo strike rate and the A/E indices.

In the final column I have divided the second run win percentage / SR% by the debut one to give us a type of Impact Value. It is not a ‘true’ IV and I call it a Comparison Strike Rate (CSR). I have used this type of calculation before in some other Geegeez articles. The higher this figure the more improvement the runners show on their second run compared to their debut.

Horses highlighted in green have seen their strike rates at least double; those in red have seen their strike rates fall. A CSR figure to bear in mind is 1.52. This is the average CSR figure when looking at the strike rate comparison for ALL sires. The table is ordered by CSR.

 

In terms of A/E indices, the same trick of dividing one number by the other is an option to compare the two values. However, I think it is simply easier to work out the difference between the two. Here is a list of any sire whose A/E index is at least 0.3 points better for second starters compared to debutants:

 

 

Twilight Son and Poets Voice have both proved to be far better value with their 2yo runners on second start compared to debut. All six in the table see significant differences. This is something we need to take into account if looking at runners sired by these six.

Reversing the idea now, here are the sires whose A/E index is at least 0.3 points better for their debutants compared to their second starters:

 

 

All five of these sires have been far better value with their 2yo debutants, and they essentially buck the general sire trend. Any 2yo on second start sired by one of these might warrant a red flag against it.

As a stats man, my mantra is the more information the better. It is true that sometimes ‘more’ can confuse the issue, but in the case of sires, comparing, analysing and having a better understanding of first and second career run data will improve our chances of finding value if backing 2yos on a regular basis.

 

Damsires

As per the first 2yo debutant article, I want to share some damsire data, too. Here are the top 15 performing damsires with 2yo second starters from a strike rate perspective (100 runs / horses minimum).

 

 

Of these 15, five secured a BSP profit (Dalakhani, Dansili, Dark Angel, Oasis Dream and Shamardal); four had A/E indices of 1.00 or higher (Dalakhani, Dubawi, Dutch Art and Bahamian Bounty).

Of all the damsires mentioned I think three are worth keeping an eye out for this year and they are the top three in terms of strike rate – Dubawi, Dalakhani and Shamardal; their figures are solid across the board. For the record, backing all 2yo second starters that were priced 6/1 (Industry SP) or shorter from any of these three would have seen 88 wins from 245 runners (SR 35.9%) for a BSP profit of £45.65 (ROI +18.6%).

 

Jockeys

An area that I thought would be interesting to look at was whether it was better for the 2yo second starter to be ridden again by the same jockey who rode them on debut. My hypothesis was that if the same jockey rode the horse again it should be a slight plus, due to the fact that the jockey would have prior knowledge of that debut run and performance. Also I am assuming that a fair proportion of these 2yos have been ridden at home on the gallops by the same pilot. Let’s check out the findings then:

 

 

It is always heartening to see a theory produce the type of stats expected. As we can see, horses that are ridden by the same jockey for a second time in their career outperform those who have a different pilot. This is true for strike rate, returns and A/E indices.

What is also comforting to see is that the yearly strike rates for these same jockey bookings have been very consistent:

 

 

There are less than 1.3 percentage points difference between the ‘best’ year in terms of win percentage / strike rate and the ‘worst’. In my second article, I plan to break this data down further by looking at individual trainer results – I am hoping a few trainers will offer up some strong stats.

 

MAIN TAKEAWAYS

To close, here are the bullet points from the above.

  1. 2yos win just over 12% of the time on second starts compared to just under 8% on debut
  1. Second time starters priced 9/4 or shorter have proved relatively poor value
  1. Horses that finished second on debut have an excellent strike rate of nearly 28% in their follow up run, but they still lost 11p for every £1 staked
  1. A debut run at either Bath, Beverley, Brighton or Chester can be considered a negative
  1. A debut run at Newmarket should often be considered a positive; 2yos racing at Newmarket who finished second or third on debut have a very solid set of figures on second runs
  1. Sires Twilight Son, Poets Voice, Bated Breath, Acclamation, Fast Company and Zebedee see their progeny perform significantly better on second starts compared to debut
  1. Dubawi, Dalakhani and Shamardal are three damsires that are worth keeping on the right side (as a general rule). This is especially true if priced 6/1 (Industry SP) or shorter
  1. Second time starters ridden by the same jockey that rode them in their first run have a much better record than if the jockey has changed

 

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I hope this article has highlighted some useful stats for Geegeez readers. It will be trainer data that comes under the microscope in that follow up. Until then...

- DR

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