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The Importance of Course/Distance Form in NH Racing

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As the title suggests, in this article I will look at horses that have previously won at the course, over the distance, and over course and distance. My findings apply to UK National Hunt racing only, and I have looked at the last eight full years, from 2016 to 2023.

The perception of many punters is that course form is important; likewise, a majority see it as a positive if a horse is proven over the distance. Let's see what I can dig up!

Course winners

Let me start with course winners. Courses in the UK are not uniform – the topography of every track is different. There may be some courses that are the same or very similar circumference, but in terms of gradient at different points, soil composition, undulations, finishing straights, and so on, they are all at least reasonably different. Likewise, hurdles and fences are placed in different locations depending on the course which again helps to make each course unique.

I want to begin by comparing the strike rates of course winners with horses that have not won at the course (non-course winners). Both win and each way figures are shown:

 

 

Course winners clearly perform better both from a win and a win & placed (each way) perspective. In terms of returns to SP, course winners still fare better although one would have lost 17p in the £ backing all of them. Non-course winners lose around 50% more at just under 26p in the £. At Betfair SP, however, there is just a penny (1%) in it.

Looking at the non-course winner group first, if we split them by: 1 -  those who have previously run at the course, and 2 -  those who have not run at the course previously, then we see that those who have never raced at the course have been slightly more successful in win percentage terms – 11.6% strike rate compared to 10.8%.

The question I now want to ask is can we find a subset of course winners that might prove profitable to follow? This seems very unlikely based on the overall data. However, below are some of the angles I delved into. Firstly, I looked at the differences in terms of number of course wins. The graph below illustrates individual win percentages by number of course wins:

 

 

The strike rates are relatively even. The highest strike rates are seen at either end of the spectrum (1 win only, and 5 or more wins).

The '5 or more wins' group is the smallest by some margin (312 qualifiers) but it did make a profit at SP and, therefore unsurprisingly, at BSP. A couple of reasonably priced winners were the main cause of the profits, but it should be noted that there was a BSP profit in six of the nine years, and five profitable years using Industry SP.

One could argue that using course wins alone might not be the best comparison. For example, ythere might be a horse that has won let’s say three times at the course from four attempts, while another may have won three races from 20 attempts. So I thought it may be prudent to look at the course win percentages for horses to broaden the picture. Here are the findings for all horses that had won at least once previously at the course:

 

 

This paints a pleasing picture for fans of course winners: as the graph indicates, the better a horse's course win percentage, the better the performance in terms of success. When we consider returns, those horses with the lowest course win percentages have struggled, incurring losses of 15p in the £ to BSP in the '1 to 10%' group and 11p in the £ for '11 to 20%' group. Meanwhile, the other groups combine to lose only 5.5p in the £.

Again though, we have to be aware that this approach also has flaws. For example, a horse could have a previous 100% course win record by racing at the course just once. Another horse with a 100% record could be four from four. Any data must always be scrutinized properly as no data set is perfect.

Before moving on to distance winners I want to examine some output for individual courses. To do this I am going look at course A/E indices for horses that have won at least once at the relevant track. Here are the courses with the ten highest A/E indices*.

*You can read more about A/E here 

 

 

These are strong figures. Out of these ten NH tracks, backing all course winners would have yielded a blind BSP profit at five of them (Cartmel, Perth, Newcastle, Kelso, Hexham), with the other five making only very small losses. It seems that past course winners can generally be seen as a positive when returning to one of these ten venues.

Distance winners

It is time to switch the focus on to distance winners. As with the course winners section, I will start by comparing the strike rates of distance winners with horses that have not won at the distance (non-distance winners). Both win and each way figures are shown once more:

 

 

These figures correlate closely with the course data shared earlier. In terms of returns to BSP the distance winners have also performed better, losing only 4p in the £ compared to 8p for non-distance winners.

Let me next look at the strike rate in terms of number of distance wins. Here are the splits:

 

 

As with the course figures, five or more distance wins comes out with the highest win strike rate. Not only that, but the group also made a blind profit to BSP, although two winners priced 41.49 and 31.48 skewed the figures a little. For the record, horses with exactly four previous distance winners broke even at BSP. It does seem therefore that numerous wins at the distance (say four or more) is more a positive than a negative.

Let's now look at distance win percentages, as I did earlier for course winners. Here are the findings for all horses that have won previously at the distance in terms of their overall career win record at the relevant distance:

 

 

We have the same upward slant once more. The higher a horse’s win percentage at the distance, the higher the win rate.

When viewing all the data, it seems therefore that distance winners are better investments than non-distance winners. It also seems that multiple wins at the distance or a high win percentage at the distance can generally be taken as positives.

Course and distance (C&D) winners

Finally, it makes sense to review the performance of course and distance winners. A quick note, a horse can have been a course winner over a different trip, and a distance winner at a different track; such horses would not be considered a course and distance winner for these purposes: we are looking specifically at winners over today's course and distance in combination.

To be absolutely clear, we are looking at horses with Eleven Eleven's CD profile, not those with Absolute Dream's C,D profile.

 

As previously I will start by comparing the strike rates of C&D winners versus horses that have not won over C&D (non-C&D winners). Both win and each way figures are shown once more:

 

 

These are the highest win percentages we have seen for the ‘winner’ group to date. However, the returns to BSP for C&D winners is only marginally better than for non-C&D winners. Therefore, the market seems to have made an appropriate price adjustment.

Onto the win strike rate in terms of number of C&D wins. Here are the splits:

 

 

It should be noted that only 357 horses managed three or more C&D successes during the time frame, with only 116 of those achieving four-plus. However, if we look at C&D winners who have won at least three times previously they have combined to make a profit of £24.49 (ROI +6.9%) to Industry SP and £68.88 (ROI 19.4%) to BSP. It looks, then, as though horses that have won at least three times over course and distance are worth a second glance from a punting perspective.

It is C&D win percentages next, and it will be interesting to see if we have the same sloping graph / correlation as we had in the two previous graphs of this type:

 

 

The trend is up, as previously, although the 51-70% group spoils the party somewhat by dropping below 14.5%! The 71% to 100% group again performs best in terms of win percentages, hitting close to one victory in every five runs.

Let's look at some individual course data now. To change it up a bit I am going to look at the performance of all courses in terms of past C&D winners running again at the course.

It is easier to fit into a table than a graph so that is the plan. I can share more data this way also. Courses are listed alphabetically with positive A/E indices (0.95 and above) shown in green and negative indices (0.79 or lower) shown in blue. Profit / losses have been calculated to BSP less 5% commission:

 

 

Seven of the 11 green courses managed a blind profit to BSP, (Fakenham, Ffos Las, Hereford, Hexham, Kelso, Newcastle, and Wincanton),and Taunton broke even. If you backed all previous C&D winners at these 11 courses (2016-2023) you would have returned a BSP profit of £184.35 to £1 level stakes (ROI +5.7%).

Combining these positive courses once more - this is how the annual figures worked out:

 

 

As can be seen, five of the eight years were in profit, and the three losing years were far from disasters losing 1.3p, 2.8p and 5p in the £ respectively.

Therefore, the data suggest that any past C&D winners declared to run at these eleven courses (Cartmel, Fakenham, Ffos Las, Hereford, Hexham, Kelso, Newcastle, Perth, Stratford, Taunton, Wincanton) should at least be shortlisted.

Now, as I have said many times, I am merely reporting on past data and we cannot be sure any of these findings will be replicated in the same way in future. However, just for fun I checked the 2012 to 2015 data for the same eleven courses to see how prior C&D winners had fared. The results were 364 winners from 2095 runners (SR 17.4%) for a BSP profit of £124.24 (ROI +5.9%). It seems therefore that these courses may offer past C&D winners an ‘edge’ over non-C&D runners.

Finally, let me share some trainers who have performed well with previous C&D winners when comparing their performance against their non-C&D winners. Eight trainers are listed in the table below comparing their win percentages for the two respective groups:

 

 

These eight all perform notably above the norm when it comes to past C&D winners. Not surprisingly, six of the eight have produced blind profits to BSP with their C&D winners. Here are their individual figures for previous C&D winners:

 

 

It should be noted that most of the qualifiers have been in the shorter to medium price range and hence the stats are not badly skewed. The A/E indices are generally strong, too. It will be interesting to see how these trainers fare in the near future with their prior C&D winners.

 

Summary

In conclusion, previous course winners, distance winners, and course and distance winners each win more often than their non-winning counterparts. As a rule, they also seem slightly better value, although the market has unsurprisingly adjusted well, as it tends to do for any material factor. Ultimately, whilst blind profits are not on offer here - who knew?! - I would view these 'contextual' past winners as more of a positive than a negative when evaluating a race.

- DR

Monday Musings: Yes, No, Wait…

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Anyone who ever played cricket will have heard those four words, Yes, no, wait….sorry! as he trudged back to the pavilion, run out by half a pitch length thanks to his partner’s indecision and then wanton sense of self-preservation, writes Tony Stafford.

If you’ve got a voice in your head, yes indeed the yesnowaitsorries are a floating ownership group, mainly of National Hunt horses. It was brought together through a joint love of cricket and racing, with the late Alan Lee, former cricket and racing correspondent for the Times, a very active member.

Over the past three months, mostly with good friend Kevin Howard, owner of the Noak Hill Shellfish Cabin off the A127 in deepest Essex, I’ve heard the same phrase trotted out at least 20 times. The project was a now 3yo gelding by Dandy Man called Edgewater Drive. The price plus Wilf Storey’s training fees was calculated based on 10 per cent shares and initially described by would-be joinees as “a cup of tea”: “Yes”, they said, almost without exception.

Next, rather than the No, it was Wait, after all Christmas was coming, the heating bills were astronomical. Well actually, better say No. As 20 dwindled down to zero, “Sorry” was replicated from a score of lips as Kevin withdrew back to the cabin, readying a bowl of jellied eels he’d promised to take to Gary Wiltshire, resident bookmaker at the owners’ room in Chelmsford racecourse.

Neil Graham, boss of Chelmsford, had been very optimistic at the meeting before last when talking about yesterday’s fixture – the first floodlit card on a Sunday in the UK. The total prize money on offer was £144k, a figure that will be replicated at Kempton on February 18.

Sunday racing in the UK had become generally a two-meeting apology, but yesterday was always going to be an exception, weather permitting. Apart from the innovative Chelmsford card, it was to be the last of three scheduled days of the Lingfield Winter Million. Friday’s first stage over jumps was unsurprisingly frozen off, but Saturday went ahead on the all-weather track with almost £250k distributed.

Then yesterday, the hoped-for miracle happened. Temperatures, stubbornly well below freezing for a week, suddenly went comfortably into positive numbers and the £492k card survived. The promise from the BHA to bolster otherwise mundane winter Sundays has made a good start. When we spoke to Neil he was anxious that the punters should roll in at Chelmsford, but as ever I was more than hopeful.

I’ve thrown in the odd Sangster family element in a good few of these articles over the years. Edgewater Drive had his two-year-old season with Ollie Sangster and didn’t make the frame in three starts. Another three times unplaced runner for Ollie, the now 3yo Floating Voter, came home in front in his first handicap – off 55 – at Wolverhampton on Saturday and that had been the plan for Edgewater Drive too until a foot injury stopped him, instead going to the sales before the plan could be tested.

On Thursday, two days before Floating Voter’s win, I was watching the early-evening all-weather action, but miscalculated and instead saw a race about to start at Pornichet, a track along the Atlantic coast from my dream holiday location, La Baule. The fact I never made it there is immaterial, so much was I brainwashed by a veteran production man on the Daily Telegraph sports desk.

Ronnie Fowler was really a news man, but liked his sport so ended up with us. With his soft West Country burr, ready smile and always with a holiday in France either to have just returned from or was about to embark upon, as I said, we knew all about La Baule.

Pornichet racecourse is what you would probably describe as Grands Provences, certainly prominent enough to have a regular spot on Attheraces (Sky Sports Racing).

The commentator had a rundown of the betting of this 4yo and up maiden, declaring that the Nicolas Clement-trained Midsummer Dance was an 8/13 shot having been a good second on her French debut a few weeks earlier.

At the same time, he remarked that the filly was making the opposite directional move than is usually the case. When Sam Sangster was looking for a trainer in France I unhesitatingly recommended M. Clement. Later we discovered that not only had Nicolas trained for Robert Sangster when he started out – he won the Arc in his first season – but also Nicolas’ father Miguel had trained for him.

From his lovely yard in Chantilly, he had prepared French Fifteen to win the Group 1 Criterium International at Saint-Cloud and, after Ray Tooth had sold him three days later, trained him for new connections to be a close second to Camelot in the 2000 Guineas.

Sam has done very well with Nicolas in the interim and when they went off at Pornichet just before 6 p.m. I heard Midsummer Dance moving along easily at the head of the 1m7f maiden race. The leader was Gruschenka and they were still hammer and tongs at the head of the 13-runner field turning for home before the favourite drew away comfortably.

She won by two and a half lengths and the runner-up was five lengths to the good over second favourite Piper’s Hill, to whom we will return in a moment.

It was as they passed the winning line first time around that I twigged. The same blue, green sleeves, green cap with white spots in which Mr S E Sangster’s horses, as differing from Manton House Thoroughbreds, which have the proper Robert Sangster colours with white cap, green spots. It’s amazing how much difference that cap switch makes.

This was the second run in France for the Mendelssohn filly Midsummer Dance. She was originally bought for $300k by a partnership including John Gunther, racing owner of the Newsells Park stallion Without Parole. I’m sure the plan was to send her to him when she won a few races.

Newsells Park, with its owner of a few years Graham Smith-Bernau, aided by General Manager Julian Dollar and Racing Manager Gary Coffey, has become one of the major players both in the sale ring and on the racecourse since Smith-Bernau acquired it.

They would have been expecting to welcome Midsummer Dance, but she failed to impress in three runs for the Gosdens and while improving to be placed a few times when switched to Harry Eustace, the rating of 59 was never going to persuade the owners to keep her.

Instead, she went to last year’s Horses In Training sale where she was knocked down to Blandford Bloodstock, probably Sam’s mate Stuart Boman, for just 12k. The one winning sibling to her was the Ralph Beckett trained Fox Vardy, who was rated in the low 90’s at one time and raced at the later stages of his career over two miles.

While with Harry Eustace, Midsummer Dance usually raced at ten furlongs, but for her first run at Chantilly last month, Nicolas Clement stepped her up to two miles and she finished an excellent second.

Now back a furlong, she stayed on well. I mentioned her UK mark of 59. When beaten three lengths at Chantilly, her victor earned a rating of 36 (x 2.2  to get the pounds from kilograms figure) hence 79.

The third horse on Friday already had a mark of 36, so having beaten him by seven and a half lengths, you would have to say she’ll be rated at least 36, maybe a shade more. That’s a minimum of 20lb higher than the UK mark. We’ll find out in a day or two.

Sam Sangster and his long-time collaborator and principal UK trainer Brian Meehan are the partners in the Mendelssohn filly. They had a bit of fun with the ownership as although carrying Sam’s (S.E Sangster) colours, she races in the name of Shelby Ltd. Maybe it should be Shelby Unlimited after the partners in Isaac Shelby, Brian’s Group 2 winner of the Greenham Stakes last year, was sold for a seven-figure sum before the 2000 Guineas to free-spending Wathnan Racing.

I mentioned Edgewater Drive at the beginning of this piece. Wilf Storey pointed out that only three horses have previously moved from Manton, the Sangster family base for more than 30 years, to his Consett, Co Durham yard.

Looking for a potential hurdler in 1993, I bought the three-year-old Caerleon gelding Great Easeby unraced from Robert: “a total slowcoach”, he said when Peter Chapple-Hyam was the trainer.  Wilf won races on good tracks, flat and jumping, culminating with success in the 24-runner Pertemps Handicap Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival. The following year, when “unbeatable” Unsinkable Boxer won the race for Martin Pipe, Great Easeby was an early faller, but started third-favourite!

Next was Jan Smuts, an expensive yearling buy for Raymond Tooth. He had a bad injury and then on third career start, pulled himself up in a flat race at Windsor.

It was thought he was unlikely to race again but had his final win in 2018 as a ten-year-old. He had been sent to Storey for free and raced a further 116 times, winning seven over flat and jumps and placed another 48 (!) times between second and fourth.

Finally, Card High. I watched out for his big white face as he toiled on Brian’s gallops every Thursday, too slow to finish last in his work! Sam’s older brothers Ben and Guy Sangster were happy to pass him on and he became another multiple winner (eight) and more than 50 per cent in the money in 50-odd runs.

Wilf, and granddaughter and assistant Siobhan Doolan, both have at least as much faith in this young, still growing three-year-old, as any of his predecessors. Wilf says: “He’ll stay.” Once they get up there on the Moor darting around avoiding the 300 sheep at Grange Farm, they usually do.

So, if you believe the sales pitch (unlike the Doubting Twenty!) and would be interested in maybe having a shot at a very cheap option to the rather pricier, but admittedly fantastically successful Geegeez.co.uk syndicates so skilfully managed by Matt Bisogno, the Editor, just give a call to Mr Storey or Ms Doolan. You’ll find them on the web.

When you get to “Yes”, never mind the No or Wait. I predict you won’t be Sorry!

- TS

Analysing Market Data in Handicaps

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In this article I will be looking at a different approach to analysing market data, writes Dave Renham. I will not be using the traditional methods of rank – favourite, second favourite, etc. – or using a specific price or price band. My focus is going to be solely on handicap races. The data has been taken from the last four full years of UK racing (2020 to 2023) and I am looking at races of between 6 and 14 runners.

My plan is to split the betting market into three thirds – in the same way that I do when I analyse draw bias. The idea here is straight-forward: horses with the shortest prices will be classified in the top third of the market, more mid-range prices will be classified in the middle third of the market, while bigger prices/outsiders will be classified in the bottom third of the market. I have used Betfair SP rather than Industry SP to do this. The reason is that with Industry SP there are more prices that are the same, which can make the splits into thirds more challenging.

One slight downfall of this method is that there is not always an even split due to the actual number of runners. However, I will use the same principles as I do for my draw bias work meaning that it should balance out fairly as the table below shows:

 

 

Hence, with 7, 10 or 13 runners, the middle third gets the extra runner, while races with 8, 11 or 14 runners the top and bottom thirds get the extra runner. Hopefully therefore, we will get a fairly accurate reflection of how the market behaves.

Each third will produce a percentage figure – in simplistic terms let us imagine a series of 100 races. If the top third of the market won 61 races, the middle third won 28 and the bottom third won 11, then the market percentages would be 61% for the top, 28% for the middle and 11% for the bottom. Clearly, we are not going to get ‘equal’ percentage splits of 33.3% for each group given the inherent accuracy of the betting market.

Handicap hurdles

I want to look at handicap hurdle splits first, and these are shown in the pie chart below:

 

 

These figures show the expected bias to the shorter priced runners (top third of betting). Close to two in every three races has a winner emerging from that portion of the market. Just one in ten races goes to the outsider group (bottom third of the market) which is perhaps slightly fewer than most people may think, me included.

Next, I grouped the races into smaller fields (6 to 8 runners), medium sized fields (9 to 11) and bigger fields (12 to 14) looking for differences. The findings were as follows:

 

 

As you can see the market bias to the front end has strengthened as the field size increases. This is a useful nugget to be aware of, especially if you strongly consider prices and market position. It also makes some sense if you consider the likely prices on offer within the specific runner groupings.

The next port of call is handicap chases.

 

Handicap chases

I have split the data for these races in the same way and am interested to see how well the figures match. It’s expected that they will correlate quite strongly, but how strongly? Let’s look at the overall market third splits first:

 

 

As expected, the splits are like the hurdle ones, but the outsider group have performed better in these races, striking at one win in eight compared with one win in ten. This is a relatively significant shift considering their outsider group status. I must admit I had expected outsiders to fare worse in handicap chases rather than better, as my perception was that handicap hurdles were harder to predict than their chasing counterpart.

Time to group the races into the three field size groupings as I did earlier. Here are the splits:

 

 

These figures do not quite fit the same pattern as handicap hurdles although there are some similarities, such as the top third of the market have the lowest win percentage in the 6 to 8 runner group once more, and by some margin. The bottom third of the market performed best in the 12 to 14 runner group, winning almost twice as often as in handicap hurdle races with similar field size.

Overall, the data is pointing to outsiders having more of a chance in handicap chases, and the front end of the market having more of a chance in handicap hurdles.

 

All-weather handicaps

Finally, it’s onto the sand to see what patterns emerge there. The overall market splits look like this:

 

 

These results are very similar to the handicap hurdle ones. The outsider group have performed the worst here with just 9.7% of wins. The front end (top third) has performed the best of the three race codes, with 64.1% of races going to that group.

Let’s now look at the splits within the field size groupings:

 

 

This conforms more to the pattern of the handicap hurdle data with the market more influential as field size grows. The top third of the market are very close to winning two-thirds of races when the field size is 12 to 14. Conversely, the bottom third of the market win only around one in every 12.

For the all-weather cohort, the data covers nearly 7000 races so it is a decent sample! Hence, I thought it would be interesting to split the market data up by class of race. Here are the findings:

 

 

There is a definite pattern here, with the front end of the market performing better as the races get weaker. At the other end of the market the reverse is true as one would expect given that initial finding. Hence, in the two better classes of race (2 and 3), the outsider group have performed better than in mid to lower class races (4 to 6). They have particularly struggled in the lowest Grade of Class 6 handicaps winning less than 9% of all races.

To conclude, when we look at the different race codes – handicap hurdles, handicap chases and all weather handicaps – the win strike rates by market splits are similar but there are important and subtle differences, too.

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Selected Cheltenham Festival Handicap Market Trends

With the Cheltenham Festival not too far away, it is worth looking at past trends of some of the big handicap races. I have looked at two Cheltenham races, the first of which is the Pertemps Handicap Hurdle over 3 miles. I have data for the last 26 renewals and the market splits for the winner are as follows:

 

 

These are the sort of figures we have seen throughout this article although horses from the bottom third of the market have slightly under-performed in this race providing less than 8% of the winners. Now this race does have big fields so given much of the data we have seen so far, this is perhaps no huge surprise.

The Plate handicap chase (2m 4½f) is the other race I have looked it, and the breakdown for that is as follows:

 

 

Here is a quite different picture with a much more level playing field, implying a far more open contest. Of course, 26 races is a smallish sample, but ‘the world and his wife’ shares Cheltenham race trends, and usually not as many as the last 26 races!

If you are a fan of big race trends, I think this type of market breakdown/analysis is a better idea than say looking at the performance of favourites, or the performances of horses priced 25/1 or bigger, etc. It gives more of an overall feel, in my view.

 

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I hope you found this slightly different perspective an interesting read. I plan to use this method to dig into turf flat races at some point in the next few months, and will share my findings then.

- DR

 

Monday Musings: The NH Numbers Game

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We’re just about into the final third of the 2023-24 jumps season in the UK and Ireland and the concluding bumper at Fairyhouse on Saturday provided an interesting statistic, writes Tony Stafford. Its winner, the debutant Romeo Coolio, ridden by Mr Harry Swan for the Gordon Elliott team, was the trainer’s 155th victory of the domestic campaign.

This, from the once reviled but now it seems fully rehabilitated and still ebullient handler, was Elliott’s 300th individual runner of the season. It brings his prizemoney tally to €3,274k.

Until the last few days, he had been ahead of his great (and hitherto too-great!) rival Willie Mullins in all categories apart from strike-rate. Willie has had to make do so far with 254 individual horses, but his 168 victories (two at Punchestown yesterday) have careered him past Elliott a shade sooner than usual. By the time we get to May, no doubt, Mullins will I’m sure be back in his usual place at the top of the pile with all those big prizes still to be won. He stands on an interim €3,387K.

Two more were added to the first-time Elliott count at Punchestown yesterday and with lots more buys from the pointing and French fields to come, it might even be feasible to expect an end-of-season accumulation of 400, but let’s play safe and suggests it will be 350, as if that wouldn’t be totally unbelievable.

If Gordon were, say, to be content with just a 20-hour waking day – he should manage four hours’ kip surely! - then he could afford to give each of the three hundred a respectable four minutes of his attention – in between driving to the tracks and speaking to the media, not to mention living of course.

No doubt though, as the season has gone on, there has been a regular in-and-out process so that the horses that favoured summer ground and opposition are sent elsewhere until their optimum part of this year comes around. Or even sold.

Even so, you must reckon on a minimum of 200 boxes either at the main yard, or sprinkled around nearby to accommodate the hordes as they prepare for their races.

Planning programmes, making entries, and generally finding alternative objectives when the weather intervenes as has been the case lately, taxes the ingenuity. In some ways it’s easy. “There are five nice races at Punchestown next week,” he might say, adding “Put those ten in that one, that lot in the next” and so on.

Meanwhile Mr Mullins is doing the same thing at his only marginally less horse-swollen base, and hence the pair go head-to-head in almost every novice, conditions race and Graded event in the calendar. I’ve never forgotten Luca Cumani’s words, however. It might have been at the time he lost the Aga Khan’s horses when, in a pique, HH decided to have nothing trained in the UK. Luca always reckoned it was easier to train a lot of horses than a lesser number. You could find the time of day about them, he argued, as Luca certainly could.

Such is the Mullins/Elliott joint domination that only two other trainers have run more than 100 horses. Third in every category is Henry de Bromhead, who despite his Gold Cup and Champion Hurdle successes has been limited to exactly half as many horses as Elliott – 151. His 62 wins have come from 51 horses, and he’s almost on €1.1million. Almost without exception, UK trainers will be saying, “I should be so limited!”

Gavin Cromwell comes next in the list with 124 horses, €700k coming from 35 individual winners of 47 races. Philip Rothwell (26 from 76) and 34 wins from 353 runners is 5th to show the extent to which the sport across the Irish Sea is dominated by a cartel that has no inclination of going away.

No wonder Elliott bristled at the prospect of any restriction in the number of horses he could run in one race. His 15 of 20 in the Troytown last November might have been only a sample of what is to come given his relentless expansion. The possible limit of four in UK handicaps, especially the Grand National, will be welcome, though not for Elliott – if any of our trainers is equipped to take advantage.

On the flat and over jumps It’s a self-fulfilling numbers game. The two Premier race day cards at Kempton and Warwick on Saturday – to which a decent Wetherby programme was grafted on, drew only the minimal attention of Irish stables.

Mullins with a third and Elliott, a fifth place, had one visitor each, but Joseph O’Brien brought Banbridge to Kempton for the Coral Silviniaco Conti Chase and he beat Pic D’Orhy to remind us that he is indeed still training jumpers. Mullins was 3rd in this with Janidil.

At one time it seemed O’Brien would make a more significant challenge to the big two, but as he has been winning races like the Melbourne Cup (twice) and Group/Grade 1 races in Ireland, the UK, the US and Dubai, the concentration has understandably been more on flat racing.

In the present jumps season, Joseph has run only 36 horses in a total of 80 races and the 14 winners have collected 16 victories. His domestic tally of €311k is respectable in the circumstances. He clearly has quality rather than quantity in mind for the winter game.

One trainer aware of the possibilities offered by the dual Premier fixtures at Kempton and Warwick was Dan Skelton, holidaying in Barbados but still ably backed up by brother Harry, who rode a Warwick double, the former champion jockey and his wife Bridget Andrews among others supervising matters on course.

The numbers game truism holds here, too. Dan Skelton, while not yet in the scale of Ireland’s big two, has still sent 191 different horses to the races this season, easily the most among UK stables. On Saturday 9% of them – viz 16 – were dispatched to the three jumps meetings and they came back to Warwickshire with six winners, one second, four third places, two fourths and a sixth.

Skelton won the Lanzarote at Kempton with 33/1 shot Jay Jay Reilly, making his first run back over hurdles since early 2022. The trainer’s other major victory came with Grey Dawning, the gelding thrillingly going clear of his field in the Grade 2 Hampton Novices Chase at Warwick. Cheltenham beckons for both and many more I would assume from this target stable. His team will be one of the main defences against the onslaught of well-treated Irish “improvers” in many of the handicaps in seven weeks’ time.

It must be a shade frustrating in comparison with what a similar haul would have brought in Ireland or France, that six wins (worth £145k and those other places, yielded 180 grand, given the trumpeting of the new concept). It was still enough to carry him past Nicky Henderson into second slot in the UK trainers’ list.

Skelton’s 70 wins from 457 runners have earned £1,370k so he stands rather more than £200k behind his former mentor and perennial champion, Paul Nicholls. The Ditcheat master, hopefully now back on terra firma after the previous week’s abandon ship call came out in his flooded stable yard, has 72 wins from 306 runs (58 from 151 individual horses) and is just a tick short of £1.6 million.

Henderson has sent out 132 horses – a visitor to Seven Barrows might ask, “Where does he find room for them all?” – and 65 wins from 266 runs and £1,235k in prizes.

An unexpected name in fourth place is Venetia Williams, not that her talent isn’t well chronicled. In a way she defies the numbers element, even if she is comfortably behind the top three at £935k. The million should come. Her achievement is notable as she has sent out only 64 horses, 25 of them winning 38 races. Nicholls, Henderson and Williams are all operating at 24% whereas Skelton is at a relatively modest 15%.

As a one-time associate used to say – and sorry Mr Hatter I’ve used it many times, including here –  “Everything is just different numbers.” It is.

The marvel of the Elliott/Mullins and to an extent Skelton achievement is to have control over such an obviously unwieldy model. How does a trainer do morning or evening stables as in the old days? I’ve been at Hughie Morrison’s yard a few years ago and the lad would present his horse as the trainer came along the line, asking how he was and checking limbs to satisfy himself. (Of course, unlike the old days when it was probably a maximum of two horses per lad, the 2020s model required a fair bit of nimbleness on the part of the grooms as they swopped to organise one of their other three or even four further on!)

You could picture Noel Murless or, from an earlier generational, Fred Darling, satisfying himself not only with the horses’ but also the lads’ appearance as he checked them off one by one. Evening stables at Elliott’s must be fun. By the time he gets round the lot, there wouldn’t be much time for a pint.

  • TS

NH Jockey Profiles: Creating Ratings

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This is the last article in my series on jockeys and, to close, I have decided to do something slightly different, writes Dave Renham. For this piece I have been number crunching using Excel and reviewing all UK National Hunt Racing results going back to the beginning of 2019.

My plan? To try to evaluate jockey performance in a different way compared with more standard horse racing approaches. The idea is relatively simple: I am going to compare a jockey’s finishing position with their market position. It will be easier to give an example so let us imagine the following set of ten results:

 

 

Using these ten results I add up both columns to compare the market position total to the finishing position total. Adding up the market positions (1 + 1 + 2 + 2 + 3 + 3 + 3 + 4 + 4 + 7) we get a total of 30. The finishing positions equal 50 (1 + 3 + 4 + 8 + 1 + 6 + 5 + 3 + 8 + 11) when added up.

Hence the jockey in this imaginary example has arguably performed below expectations as the total of finishing positions is higher than the total of market positions. Now my idea is to give this overall performance a numerical figure by dividing the market position total by finishing position total. In this case we would get a performance rating of 0.60 (30 divided by 50).

I soon realised, though, that I had an issue with non-completions: horses that fell, unseated, were brought down, or pulled up. I decided it made sense to group all such horses giving them a position in last place. Doing it this way each jockey would be affected in the same way creating as level a playing field as I could. Whether this is the ‘ideal’ I am not sure, but it made the most sense to me.

So let’s start by looking at the 20 jockeys with the highest performance ratings. To qualify each needed to have at least 300 rides during the five-year period.

 

 

In general, this list contains lesser-known jockeys most of which actually have quite a poor win record. This is illustrated in the table below which shows their overall record in terms of strike rate / returns:

 

 

The question that springs to mind, then, is why are these jockeys producing the highest ratings? I believe there are two things in play here. Firstly, if we look at the majority of their each way percentages, they are higher than one might expect given their respective win percentages. John Kington is an excellent example of this with his each way percentage roughly five times higher than his win percentage. As a general rule in racing, the each way percentage is around 2½ times bigger than the win percentage.

And secondly, most of these jockeys normally ride outsiders, and if you are riding the outsider in a field of 10, any result other than 10th will give you a performance rating of greater than 1.00. Clearly, for shorter priced horses that are at the top end of the betting market, it is harder for those to beat their market rank with their finishing position. Indeed, favourites are unable to beat their finishing position – they can only match it should they win, or fall behind it.

I decided therefore that it would be a better idea to create jockey performance ratings within different Starting Price brackets, which would produce a more level playing field. The price brackets I chose to focus on, which granted were somewhat arbitrary, were: 3/1 or shorter, 100/30 to 5/1, and 11/2 to 8/1.

3/1 or shorter – let’s consider the shortest price bracket first. I have used a minimum of 50 rides and here are the top performing jockeys in terms of my performance ratings model. Overall, the ratings within this price bracket will look relatively low, for the reasons I mentioned earlier:

 

 

It is interesting (and pleasing) to see Charlotte Jones topping the list – she was discussed positively in the two most recent articles in the series. Her record reads a hugely impressive 28 winners from 51 (SR 54.9%) for an SP profit of £28.18 (ROI +55.3%). Also, as the graph clearly shows, she and Theo Gillard are well clear of the rest of the top ten.

I also want to share the ratings of the main jockeys who have appeared in this jockey series as well as some others I’ve mentioned along the way:

 

 

It is surprising perhaps to see de Boinville with the poorest rating with these well fancied runners. However, I did some digging, and he pulls up these shorter priced runners much more often than the average jockey (5.6% compared 3.5%). Hence, this looks the most likely reason why he is a significant amount below the rest.

 

100/30 to 5/1 – now a look at the middle price bracket. Again, here are top ten jockeys in terms of my performance ratings:

 

 

Patrick Wadge tops the list and by a comfortable margin in relative terms. It should come as no surprise therefore that he has been profitable with these runners to the tune of 31 pence in the £ to SP, 45p in the £ to BSP. Specifically, he has had 57 runners of which 15 won (SR 26.3%). Fergus Gillard has also proved nicely profitable thanks to his 26 winners from 104 rides (SR 25%). Profits to SP stand at +£28.65 (ROI +27.6%); to BSP +£38.54 (ROI +37.1%).

Now at look at the ‘main’ jockeys again – McMenamin featured in the top ten above so is not included again – he would have led this list and by a comfortable margin:

 

 

Again, we can see that Nico de Boinville is clear at the bottom. His strike rate with these runners has been 14.8%, with SP losses of over 28 pence in the £. Compare that with the average figures for all jockeys where the strike rate is 17.2% and losses are only at 12p in the £.

 

11/2 to 8/1 – onto the final price bracket into which we will look in detail. Once more I have collated the jockeys with the top ten ratings:

 

 

Two ladies top the list, with Charlotte Jones appearing again, this time in second place, and once again she has proved profitable to the tune of 19p in the £. Tabitha Worsley tops the pile, though, with an impressive 1.04 figure.

The shame for Tabitha Worsley is that she gets limited opportunities on better horses. 65% of her rides in the past five seasons have been on horses priced 16/1 or bigger; 44% have been 33/1 or bigger. If we consider her overall record on horses from the top three in the betting, they have essentially broken even to SP and, to BSP, have seen returns of 12p in the £.

A look now at the ‘main’ jockeys with horses priced 11/2 to 8/1:

 

 

It’s a familiar story for Nico de Boinville, whose allegiance with Nicky Henderson means almost everything he rides is over-bet; while Danny McMenamin again tops the list, continuing his decent ratings performance across the board.

 

Higher prices - I did briefly look at other price brackets and here are a few headlines:

For horses priced 17/2 to 11/1, once again two female jockeys had the highest ratings – Emma Smith-Chaston was top with 1.15, while Lilly Pinchin was second with 1.14. Danny McMenamin scored well again, with 1.02, topping the main group of jockeys. Nico de Boinville was not bottom of the main group this time with his score of 0.83; that dubious accolade went to Harry Cobden who was on 0.82.

Looking at the 12/1 to 18/1 bracket Paddy Brennan was third out of all the jockeys with an excellent 1.21 rating. Meanwhile, de Boinville was second worst out of ALL jockeys with a figure of 0.92. In the 20/1+ group, Tabitha Worsley and Danny McMenamin both appeared again in the top ten scoring 1.23 and 1.22 respectively.

It seems abundantly clear from these figures that Nico is hugely over-bet by the wagering public and Danny McMenamin is still vastly under-rated.

*

This article has hopefully fuelled some food for thought amongst readers. In order to make money at horse racing one needs to have an edge over the ‘crowd’. Ideas like these performance ratings have the potential to give us that edge.

While I am not remotely suggesting that these numbers are the holy grail of jockey ratings, what I am clear about is that if we don’t test out new theories or ideas, we are probably going to bet in very similar ways to everyone else. That is unlikely to give us the long-term edge most punters dream of.

Before I finish, this type of idea could be used to create horse performance ratings or trainer performances ratings, too. I might look into either or both in a future piece.

- DR

Monday Musings: The Striker and the Mouse foiled by Dickens

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I suppose waterlogged Sandown on Saturday was one of the much heralded (but hard to find as far as my rubbish Internet researching skills were concerned) 170 Premier meetings that will enhance the racing experience in 2024, writes Tony Stafford.

Apart from the issue of expecting some extra prizemoney when unscheduled meetings such as Newcastle on Saturday are drafted on to live ITV coverage as a fill-in, there’s nothing much to remember about the weekend in the UK. The seven races at Gosforth Park had combined winners’ money of just over £29k. Scandalous really on a Saturday, especially if the course, as I would imagine, gets an ITV bung to go with the already-generous normal broadcast payment.

Meanwhile in California, Frankie Dettori was up to seven winners since Boxing Day after a Friday treble and a Saturday single at Santa Anita. No wonder, as he told Richard Hills, he’s enjoying himself and liking his percentages of the generous California prizemoney as well as the sunshine.

Then, over in South Africa, Piere ‘Striker’ Strydom, 57, so Frankie’s senior by four years, and with more than 5,000 career winners to his credit, was also coming to the close of his mainly domestic but similarly stupendous career. He went to the races on Saturday hoping for a record-equalling seventh success in the L’Ormarins King’s Plate over a mile at Hollywoodbets Kenilworth. (Do you mind if I just call it the King’s Plate at Kenilworth from now on?).

Piere seemed to have the whip hand leading up to the King’s Plate as his mount See It Again had beaten 7/5 joint-favourite Charles Dickens quite comfortably when they met late last year in the WSB Green Point Stakes over the same course and distance. Then again, Charles Dickens hadn’t got the best of runs and could get going only soon enough for second.

See It Again is trained by Michael ‘Muis’ (or ‘Mouse’) Roberts, 69, many times champion jockey in his native South Africa, with two wins in the King’s Plate. He rode with great success in the UK and was champion jockey in 1992, and is probably best remembered for his partnership with the brilliant multiple group 1 winner Mtoto. That sound middle distance champion was twice successful in the Eclipse Stakes for Ahmed Al Maktoum and the late Alec Stewart. I will return to Master Roberts later.

The first of Strydom’s six King’s Plate victories came in 1990, coincidentally the year that Aldo Demeyer, partnering his main rival Charles Dickens on Saturday, was born. Strydom wasn’t the only jockey aiming to match Anton Marcus’ seven wins. Bernard Feyd’herbe made it six when upsetting the odds-on Charles Dickens last year with Al Muthana, who was also in the field with Bernard in the plate.

In the event, Charles Dickens didn’t just gain his revenge on those two, he obliterated them with a show of class and speed.

He had two and three-quarter lengths to spare over See It Again. Once more, Al Muthana’s run in fourth bettered what was expected of his 33/1 status.

The first two are slated to go to stud shortly. See It Again, until he beat Charles Dickens last time, had been racing over longer distances and Roberts has that option again before the final decision on a stud career is made. Successful owner-breeders Drakenstein Stud and trainer Candice Bass-Robinson can now anticipate a lucrative career as a stallion for Charles Dickens who stands at ten wins from 13 runs with three places on the racecourse.

He’s a son of South African champion sire, the US-bred Trippi. There’s a UK element to See It Again’s background as he is a son of Twice Over, a four-time Group 1 winner for Henry Cecil and Khalid Abdullah, including two Champion Stakes.

The tough, durable and honest Twice Over, whose final race was when fourth behind stablemate Frankel as a seven-year-old in the Juddmonte International at York, was bought and syndicated as a stallion by my friend Bernard Kantor.

Twice Over has proved a great success at stud. Bernard, of course, was co-founder and chairman for many years of Investec, the bank that sponsored the Derby for much of this century, helping it regain its international status.

Earlier on the card, the filly that was preferred to those principals in the big race for Horse Of The Year honours last time around, Princess Calla, was beaten in a 1m1f fillies’ and mares’ Group 1 race, Beach Bomb coming out on top by a neck. One of the performances that earned her award was when beating See It Again last July; Charles Dickens must be favourite for that distinction this time.

My Michael Roberts tale is simply told. Some bright spark suggested during my Daily Telegraph days that it might make a good feature if we would follow him around as he moved from course to course by small plane. Another couple of jockeys were with us but they were riding elsewhere. The pilot, Neil, who used to fly Frankie very often, warned that when he dropped us off for Leicester, time was limited with the other jockeys going on elsewhere; so as we went to get out, the plane was already moving gently forward.

The nimble Mr Roberts skipped out and away from trouble, but the more cumbersome pressman lingered a second or so, collecting his luggage when bash, the tail wing smashed into his back.

I was knocked flat, well flattish anyway. As the plane continued its progress, I assured Michael I was okay, and we moved over to the waiting taxi for Leicester races. By the time I got home that evening, there was a wide bruise across the middle of my back and it stayed there for much of that summer! That must have happened at least 35 years ago.

When I saw the result of the King’s Plate, indeed all through the winner’s career, I’ve internally reminisced about his namesake, a chaser with, I thought, Alex, but apparently Alan Kilpatrick. After such a long while, time and horses coalesce, but it was more than 50 years ago that the remarkable Major (later honorary Colonel Sir) Piers Bengough rode Charles Dickens to three consecutive wins (1970-72) in the Grand Military Gold Cup at Sandown Park.

Old Etonian Bengough already had an interesting life in the army, stationed in Germany where he found time to train up to 11 of his own horses, winning races at Hanover, Dusseldorf, and Dortmund. Then it was back home with the Royal Hussars as the regiment’s Commanding Officer between 1971-73.

A long-standing member of the Jockey Club, he held several senior positions, but nothing was more appropriate for the tall, moustachioed army officer than to become for 15 years Her Majesty’s Representative at Royal Ascot, following the Marquess of Abergavenny.

It was he who had the final say when access to Ascot’s Royal Enclosure held much more of a social meaning than nowadays. One memorable occasion which made all the red-top papers was the exclusion of Joan Collins on the basis that she was wearing someone else’s badge! Fair enough Joanie!

Lady Bengough was a remarkable woman too. At the age of nine, Bridget Adams was the youngest in the UK to have earned a silver medal for figure skating and developed that skill to the extent that she represented the UK at the Olympics. Dutifully by his side at the races for all their years together, Lady Bengough survived her husband by 15 years.

- TS

What to expect in 2024

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The new year is well upon us now and, on this fourth day of January, a few resolutions may remain intact. Chocolate, biscuits, cakes (and especially chocolate biscuit cakes) and beer are largely off the agenda for a bit here - yes, life is currently very dull - but, on a much more interesting note, below are some words around what is on the 2024 agenda for geegeez.co.uk...

 

Racecard Small Changes

We'll start with a 'not very rock n'roll' update: a collection of small changes to the racecards. Although small, most of them are things many users repeat countless times while navigating the software in search of interesting horses.

22nd January Update

These changes are now live and you can see them in action in the video below - there's a timeline below the video:

00:00 Intro
00:31 Save Racecard Filters (desktop & mobile)
02:45 Actual Race Distance in form blocks
04:16 Full Form UK/Ire filter
05:25 'By Time' Racecard view now has time order dropdown
06:40 Asterisked notes
09:10 Run Style added to Full Result
11:00 Removed 'abandoned' meeting non-runners from Tracker
11:35 Outro

 

Editorial Explainer

First up is a racecard menu filters 'memory' - currently, a user must select parameters from the racecard menu filters section each time they close and open the cards menu page. If you use the same filters all the time, you have to reinstate them each time. Faff. We'll sort that.

[Incidentally, if you sometimes see there are no races displaying on the menu page, just hit the 'reset' button top right]

 

Next, an asterisk on the form row when you have a note saved for any/all of meeting, race or runner - to notify you that it's there.

 

Also, we'll be displaying the specific race distance and any distance amendments when you hover over the 'Race Conditions' on any form row:

 

And, if you choose to view the racecard menu page 'by time' you can view the race dropdown ordered by time.

 

If run style is of interest to you, we're adding each horse's early pace position to the full results:

 

We'll get those small, but perfectly formed, changes live later this month.

 

Betfair Data

One of the projects for later in the year is to incorporate Betfair data - Betfair Starting Price (BSP) as well as in-running high and low prices. We actually have these data in our system but adding them appropriately to results and into the tools will take a while. But it's on our to do list.

For a lot of readers who have been restricted, some of the BSP results are likely to make eye-opening reading, certainly when compared to SP.

 

Ratings Model

This is one of those dreaded rabbit holes into which I vowed we'd never delve. Well, we have already sunk a good few hours into the project and we've made some promising progress; but there is  much still to do. I'm at the point now where, for the first time, I do believe we can produce a set of ratings that a) finds a lot of winners and b) highlights some value.

The process involves creating separate models for separate groups of races, and if/when we get as far as publication, we'll do it piecemeal. That is, once we're happy with, for instance, our all-weather sprint handicap model, we'll publish numbers for all-weather sprint handicaps. And so on.

There are loads of ratings out there, many of which are very good at finding winners - but due to the fact they're published so widely they are significantly loss-making. Our Peter May ratings get close to break even at Betfair SP with their top rated picks every year, sometimes turning a small profit and sometimes a small loss. And we might not be able to fare better than that.

My main point is that, unless we find something of utility, as opposed to the somewhat ornamental numbers produced by the fashionable houses, we'll not publish.

 

Query Tool

QT is a powerful means of analysing large chunks of racing data and, once that's done, of saving specific 'QT Angles' to your own account and being notified of qualifiers each day. It's been unchanged for a few years now, and we've aborted a few attempts at an upgrade; but I have so many things I want to add to QT - a majority of them from your feedback and suggestions - and, once we've re-engineered a QT 2.0 engine, it will be relatively straightforward to deploy that extra functionality.

This WILL happen in 2024, it's been too long.

 

*

As you can see, apart from the small changes due for release this month, we've got a couple of pretty big 'how long is a piece of string' projects for later in the year. The Betfair element shouldn't be too onerous but I'd like to put some developer time into the modelling next. Very, very loose timeline would be aiming to get some flat rating models on stream for the start of the turf season; then perhaps pivoting to the Betfair and QT projects before reverting to the remaining race code ratings models.

There is a lot of scope for timelines to change, but these are the 2024 resolutions for geegeez. Let's hope they last longer than my personal attempts at self-improvement!

Matt

p.s. away from the bright lights of geegeez, there are a couple of other interesting projects on the go. One, a tote ticket builder, should hopefully be available very soon (I've been using it for a year!), and the other, TennisProfits.com, is a site for tennis traders that we're hoping to make more accessible for bettors, too. I'll share snippets on these from time to time as the year progresses. The tote ticket project especially is one that I think will be of great interest to many geegeez readers/racing punters.

Roving Reports: A Boxing Day Miracle

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The first piece of good news I receive regarding the working day is the start time for my pick-up from Leicester, writes David Massey. I’ve heard some horror stories from lads that have worked Boxing Day at Kempton previously. Half-five starts to miss the traffic seemed almost to be the norm, so I’m delighted when I’m told it’ll be a 7.30 collection. That still means getting up at 6.20 for a quick shower and out, but that almost feels like a lie-in given what I was expecting. 

However, I’m about to make my first and second mistakes of the day. As I need petrol, I’ve also decided to pick myself up a McD’s breakfast from the restaurant next door to the pumps, and kill two birds with one stone. As it turns out, the two turtle doves remain untouched by shot, as not only is the petrol station still closed, so’s my breakfast. Nothing’s open until 8am. I do at least fill up at a nearby Shell and grab two bars of chocolate, which is entirely within the Breakfast Rules Of Christmas Week. 

My lift is waiting as I pull into the car park. From here it should be about two hours to Kempton, with barely a car on the road. If there’s two days when, as a workman, I love traveling, it’s Boxing Day and New Year’s Day. It’s a joy to go to places like Cheltenham and Fakenham when the roads are as clear as a bell. 

Having said that, I’m amazed how many cars we see on the hard shoulder of the M1. “They’ve all run out of petrol”, says Irish Joe, in the car with us for a lift. He might have a point. I can’t believe they’ve all broken down, but, like me, I can believe they couldn’t find a petrol station early in the morning and haven’t made it to one before the juice has run dry. Careless, lads. 

We get to Kempton around 9.40am and set the two joints up. The pick isn’t for another 90 minutes, so I’ve time to wander off to find a tea and a bacon roll from somewhere. There are plenty of familiar faces to chat to, and I’m delighted to bump into James Millman, who is his usual effervescent self. I like James a lot, not least because he puts plenty of homework into his selections when he’s on the telly; and if you ask him about one from the yard you’ll always get a straight answer. I wish him well for the day, but not before I tell him Hewick will win the King George. 

It’s pick time and once we’re settled up, we get up and running. I have to say the crowd does not look huge, but to be fair plenty are still coming in, so there’s reason to be optimistic. As we’re in the Silver Ring, we aren’t expecting big bets, but it isn’t long before the other pitch takes a £100 each-way on Russian Ruler at 4s. 

It’s slow to get going on our pitch, mind, only picking up in the half-hour before the race. As tends to be the case on days like this, the general public latch on to the same couple of horses in each race; this is both good and bad: good because the book makes itself, bad because it can mean you’ve got a lop-sided look to things. 

Anyway, Blow Your Wad is no good to us in the first but on the plus side, punters now have money to play with. We get betting on the Kauto Star but here’s a problem already - my keyboard has packed up. I can’t take a bet. The last thing you need on a day like this is technical issues. Poor Morley is flat out trying to pay out and take bets whilst I reset everything to try and get it working. Thankfully, after a couple of failed attempts, on the third go it starts working again. 

Hermes Allen is backed almost to the exclusion of everything else. One punter does have £120 on impressive winner Il Est Francais at 8-5 (it saves the change) but him aside, it’s a one-sided book. 

I’m a lovely, patient soul, as you know, but I have to say this - don’t come to me asking “how does this all work, I’ve never placed a bet before” when there’s a queue of 25 behind you and you want a pound on something. Please ask when it’s quieter, such as when I’ve gone home. (I’ll add she also wanted to pay on her card.) 

Constitution Hill time. The inevitable £2.50ew bet comes in early on, as does someone having a tenner win. Those are the only two bets we will take on him, although word reaches us of someone having £100ew at 1-10 in Tatts. A profit of £12.50. You may scoff, but that’s an interest rate you’ll not get at Barclays. The Hill doesn’t come out of first gear, never mind second. Surely they are playing for second come March. Incidentally, as he coasted past the post in front, there were one or two boos among the crowd. Is that where we are now? We boo short-priced top-class horses for winning easily? Hardly his fault it wasn’t much of a race. 

Big race time, and everyone’s having a bet. But hang on - the keyboard’s knackered again. Not now, keyboard. I’ve no time to repair - it just gets binned off and we do the best we can. They want Bravemansgame, which is perhaps not a surprise. Plenty of £20 and £40 bets come for him and he’s our loser. Shishkin is second worst. I’m just praying he jumps off, as the last thing I need to be doing is explaining to novice punters they won’t get their money back if he comes under orders and digs in again. 

There’s time for a bit of food and a drink as the race progresses, but as they go past us with a lap to go, I remark to Tim, who I’m working with, that my money on Hewick is done. He looks to be going nowhere. Shishkin appears to have matters in hand but somehow Nico is dislodged from the saddle after two out. The crowd roar as Bravemansgame is left in front but a riderless Shiskin gets in his way, and it looks like a fight between him and Allaho for victory. But wait! Who is this steaming down the outside?! Hewick, who couldn’t keep up for two miles and six furlongs of this contest, has hit top gear and sails past them on the run-in! “Never in doubt!” shouts Tim, and the pair of us burst out laughing. What a result, and a short payout queue to boot!

It’s a good job that three of the front four in the market fill the places in the maiden hurdle, as all the punters wanted was fivers and tenners each-way on all the rags. Had Sea Invasion - a horse I like a lot, by the way - got third rather than fourth, it might well have been a losing race. But it’s fine, no damage done and Mahon’s Glory is a cracking result in the last. 

We pack the gear up, get paid and all we need to do now is get out of the car park. There are queues of cars everywhere, none of them going anywhere very quickly. Pick a line, join it, and hope it moves. Ours does after about fifteen minutes and we’re out and back on the M3 in twenty. Back to Leicester for half six and home for 7.15. My first Boxing Day at Kempton is done. I’ve enjoyed it, but I’m knackered. Just another year until we do it all again!

Happy New Year everyone! 

NH Jockey Profiles: The Younger Generation

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It is the turn of the younger up and coming riders to come under the spotlight in my series on National Hunt jockeys, writes Dave Renham. For this piece I have used a variety of data collection tools and as with the previous five pieces the profits/losses quoted are to Industry SP; I will quote Betfair SP when appropriate. I will be analysing a more recent National Hunt data set for UK racing than in the earlier articles, in this case starting from 1st Jan 2019 and running to 25th Dec 2023.

In the fifth article in the series, I highlighted Charlotte Jones and her overall record with trainer James Moffatt, so she seemed a good starting point for this one.

Charlotte Jones

Let's look firstly at her overall record in the past five years:

 

 

These stats are extremely impressive. To BSP, Jones's profits soar to £509.30. She has made a profit to SP in four of the five years, with the other one breaking even. To BSP every year has been profitable. It is worth stating that she has had some big priced winners, which naturally skews profits and returns somewhat. However, she has been profitable and consistent even when focusing on the front end of the market. The table below include results from all horses priced 6/1 or shorter broken down by year:

 

 

Every year has been profitable, and comfortably so, which considering the price bracket is very impressive. Her overall A/E index for these 6/1 or shorter runners stands at 1.54 which is outstanding.

Let me now look her record by trainer. We know her record with Moffatt is excellent, and the Cartmel-based trainer provides most of her rides. The table below compares her record with Moffatt against all other trainers combined.

 

 

On first viewing, this is some contrast. However, we need to put the ‘all other trainers’ data in more context as only five of those rides were on horses priced in single figures, and just three were in the top three in the betting. Further, there are only 35 runners compared with 301 for Moffatt.

Jones primarily rides in the north and, as stated, Cartmel is her local track. At the Lake District venue she has ridden 25 winners from 95 (SR 26.3%) for a small SP profit of £4.08 (ROI +4.3%). Hexham is a course where she has an even better record thanks to 11 wins from 31 rides (SR 35.5%) for a profit of £9.82 (ROI +31.7%).

Before moving on, Jones managed to ride five winners in a row in November 2023 – three on the 10th November and two on the 11th. Not many jockeys achieve that feat. Hopefully she will get more opportunities in the coming months and years. (STOP PRESS – the day I was writing this up, Boxing Day, Jones had two rides at Aintree for Moffatt, and both won at 13/2 and 6/1 respectively).

 

Danny McMenamin

Danny McMenamin was Champion Conditional Jockey in the 2020-21 season. He rode out his claim in February 2021 and since then he has continued to impress. Below is a breakdown of his win and each way strike rate by year:

 

 

As the graph indicates there has been no drop off since riding out his claim at the beginning of 2021, and 2023 was one of his best years. Indeed, his last six rides before Christmas produced four winners, at 9/1, 9/2, 10/11 and 5/2, and one second at 10/1.

In terms of trainers Nicky Richards provides McMenamin with the most rides, and below the table shows trainers who have used him 75 times or more since 2019:

 

 

Three of the four trainers are in the black in terms of profits, even to SP. And even the negative SP ROI with Richards goes into profit at BSP to the tune of £27.18 (ROI +10.0%). Riding for Ann Hamilton has produced some excellent results – a strike rate close to 30% is outstanding. Not only that, but considering he is 0 from 16 with horses priced 20/1 or bigger means focusing in on the rest gives 23 wins from 64 (SR 35.9%) for a profit to SP of £43.72 (ROI +68.3%); to BSP it is +£75.42 (ROI +118.5%).

In terms of courses, McMenamin has ridden at least 50 times at nine different venues. Below shows the win and each way strike rates at all of them:

 

 

As you can see, his record is consistent / similar across all of them. Hence at this early stage in his career there is no stand-out course for which to keep an eye out.

Before moving on, Danny McMenamin has a good record on clear favourites, with a  strike rate of 41.1% (62 wins from 151) for a small SP profit of £16.70 (ROI +11.1%). To BSP this improves a smidge to +£23.54 (ROI +15.8%).

 

Bryan Carver

Bryan Carver first caught my eye at the end of 2019 / beginning of 2020 when he rode six winners out of eight including an 883/1 treble at Exeter on New Year’s Day 2020. Since then, he has ridden out his claim at the beginning of April 2022 and now plies his trade mainly in the South of England, Wales, and the Midlands. Just 7% of his rides in the past five years have been in the Northern part of England or in Scotland.

The small stable of trainer Chris Honour has provided him with the most rides during the period of study and below are his stats with all trainers for whom he has had at least 50 rides:

 

 

The A/E indices are all above 1.00 which indicates value, and his record with these four trainers is better than compared with all other trainers for whom he has ridden. Combining these other trainers together gives the following figures:

 

 

I think Carver has been a little unlucky not to get a real break with one of the bigger stables since riding out his claim. Luck plays a part in any walk of life as we know; it would be a shame if Carver ends up as a journeyman type of jockey in my view.

Here are three additional stats for Carver worth sharing:

  1. When riding clear favourites he has secured 42 wins from 105 (SR 40%) for an SP profit of £8.77 (ROI +8.4%). To BSP the profits edge up to £13.88 (ROI +13.2%).
  1. He has ridden at Exeter more than anywhere else and his record there is excellent. He has had 18 winners from only 86 rides (SR 20.9%) for an SP profit of £56.75 (ROI +66%). To BSP his profits reads £80.54 (ROI +93.7%).
  1. He has a good record in races of three miles or more, performing best in these longer races compared to other distance groups as the graph below indicates:

 

 

This is an unusual jockey trend based on the stats of the jockeys analysed in previous articles. In these three-mile+ races he has secured a blind profit to SP returning 23p in the £, and his A/E index stands at a solid 1.03. One would have also made good profits betting his mounts each way in such races. It should also be noted that he made solid profits in these 3-mile+ races when focusing solely on runners from the top three in the betting market. Those figures read 25 wins from 98 (SR 25.5%) for a profit to SP of £16.19 (ROI +16.5%).

 

Rex Dingle

Rex Dingle announced himself to the racing world when winning on the 25/1 shot Indefatigable in the Martin Pipe Conditional Jockeys' Handicap hurdle at the 2020 Cheltenham Festival. He is currently riding primarily for Anthony Honeyball and Chris Gordon, and let me start by looking at his overall record since the beginning of 2019:

 

 

This is a very solid record and to BSP he has made a small profit of £28.85 (ROI +2.7%).

My next port of call is splitting Dingle's win and each way stats up by year and this is shown in the graph below:

 

 

What immediately catches the eye is the dip in 2021. This coincides with when he was no longer able to claim his 3lb allowance. It had been at the end of December 2020 when he rode out his claim and clearly the next 12 months were a difficult adjustment. In fact, the start of 2021 was particularly difficult with just 7 winners from 100 rides (SR 7%) between January and April. The rest of 2021 began to show an uptick with 15 wins from 121 (SR 12.4%), while it should also be noted that the final eight months of the year saw 31% of his rides making the frame compared with just 17% during the first four months.

In terms of trainers there are three trainers apart from Honeyball for whom Rex has had at least 50 rides. The splits are shown below:

 

 

A one in five strike rate for Honeyball is impressive despite not quite getting into SP profit. His record for Paul Webber is poor, but Webber’s overall strike rate going back to 2019 is only 5.4% which helps explain Dingle’s figure.

The partnership with Honeyball has been particularly potent at Fontwell with 14 winners from 51 (SR 27.5%) for an SP profit of £5.14 (ROI +10.1%). This pairing has also performed extremely well when the horse has been clear favourite. Under these circumstances Honeyball and Dingle have combined to win 35 from 75 (SR 46.7%) for a profit to SP of £11.66 (ROI +15.6%); to BSP this increases slightly to £15.42 (ROI +20.6%).

Looking at Dingle’s record for all trainers, it is worth checking out his record in handicaps compared to non-handicaps. These results may surprise a few:

 

 

It is rare for jockeys to score more regularly in handicaps, but Dingle certainly has. The difference between the two race types is significant. While it is true that Dingle had a handicap winner priced 80/1, of all the horses priced over 25/1 in handicaps this was his only success from 58 runners. Hence when taking these bigger priced runners into account this sole winner does not skew the profit figures that much in reality. The non-handicap figures are quite poor especially the bottom line – this is very likely a function of riding for shrewd trainers who like to get their horses competitively handicapped.

 

Jonjo O’Neill, Jr.

Jonjo is the son of the trainer Jonjo O’Neill, Sr., and was the conditional Champion in the 2019/20 season. Here is his overall record since the beginning of 2019:

 

 

Jonjo Jr. has averaged nearly 400 rides a year which makes him one of the busier jockeys on the circuit. Let us see a yearly breakdown of strike rate both to win and each way:

 

 

O’Neill saw a small dip in success the year after losing his claim (2021), and since then he has nudged back up a little. As a 3lb claimer he won 20% of his races, compared with 15.6% since riding without that weight allowance.

I want to split his performance now by race type. It should be noted that he has also had two spins in hunter chases which are not shown.

 

 

A similar performance level has been achieved across the board, but his NH Flat record shows the best strike rate and a near break-even scenario at starting price. These figures are not skewed by big priced winners. For his father, the NHF strike rate hits 19.4% (26 wins from 134) with a small return of just under 8p in the £ to boot.

In terms of trainers, 72% of O’Neill, Jr. rides have been for O'Neill, Sr., and the only other significant trainer in terms of rides has been Colin Tizzard, who is now retired. His strike rate for O’Neill Senior is 17%, for all other trainers combined this drops to 12.6%.

I want to finish by looking at Jonjo Jr's course data, restricting it to courses where he has had at least 60 rides. The win strike rates are shown in the graph below.

 

 

As can be seen the performance varies markedly from course to course. Four tracks (Carlisle, Huntingdon, Southwell, and Warwick) have yielded strike rates above 22%. Of these, three have turned an SP profit – Carlisle, Huntingdon, and Warwick. Indeed, at Warwick O’Neill has been in profit in all five individual years. Hence, Warwick is a course to note whenever he has booked rides there. In contrast, six courses have seen win strike rates below 11.5%, with three of these under 7%.

O’Neill is in his mid-20s so could easily have another 20 years in the saddle. It will be interesting to see how he progresses in the years to come.

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The five jockeys discussed in this piece are worth keeping a close eye on over the coming months and years. It will be interesting to see which, if any, of them will make it to the very top of the National Hunt riding tree.

- DR

 

New Year Musings: Of Moore’s Grand ‘salam

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They were certainly getting excited after Galopin Des Champs came back to form with a 23-length romp in the Savills Chase at Leopardstown on Thursday, writes Tony Stafford. They reasoned that in beating market rival Gerri Colombe by that margin, he was reasserting his place at the head of the steeplechasing tree. He probably was.

The 2023 Gold Cup winner had been beaten twice since the Cheltenham centrepiece, each time by Fastorslow, at Punchestown in the spring and then on his comeback to action in November. Therefore, he needed to do something to restore his reputation.

Even after those two less than sparkling shows, the surprise to me was that the two horses on Thursday had been as close together in the market on the day as they were, with an official 11lb between them before this encounter.

Galopin Des Champs did indeed power away up the Leopardstown run-in, but just imagine a different scenario, one where Gerri Colombe, rather that Gordon Elliott aiming him at a very likely minimum second prize of €33k (the winner got 70k more), he would have gone elsewhere.

Had Gordon declined this clash, would we have been quite so enamoured of a 23.25 lengths defeat of the 80/1 Willie Mullins field bolsterer Capodanno, who almost denied the Elliott horse that handy runner-up money? Capodanno is rated 20lb inferior to Galopin Des Champs and ran almost exactly to his rating. Nice enough, but it’s easy to take a secondary view, that Gerri Colombe simply did not run to form.

Over the week, there were many good performances either side of the water, with novices over here from such as Nicky Henderson and Paul Nicholls leading the way. In other words, they were provided by those trainers with the financial owner firepower to challenge the Mullins/Elliott and De Bromhead otherwise open goal into the Irish pointing (and French) marketplaces.

That triumvirate took some collective stopping at home and most of the big level-weight races had the look of, and proved to be, Willie Mullins benefits. Willie’s brother Tony – a good friend for many years – did speak out against the obscene situation in some major handicaps, especially over fences, where multiple entries by a single trainer make success for him in them almost a formality. He was less critical of his brother’s total dominance in the big stuff, though!

The obvious example has been (and no doubt the one that caused Tony’s ire) last month’s 20-runner Troytown Handicap Chase at Navan. Elliott supplied 15 of the runners and duly won it with Coko Beach. That tough grey then showed his credentials for this year’s Grand National with a staying-on second in the 3m2f Becher Chase over the big fences last month.

Another non-winning but significant run over those obstacles had been made a month earlier by a six-year-old, already winner of three chases before that, making his season’s comeback. The son of Dream Well had evaded the, in his case, not so all-seeing eye of Harold Kirk and found his way into the Gary Moore rather than Mullins yard after an encouraging debut second in July 2020 at Clairefontaine, a nice track not far from Paris.

The horse is called Nassalam. He recorded wide-margin hurdle wins as a juvenile on arrival for Moore and now he was noted coming on late into sixth after getting a long way behind in the Grand Sefton over 2m6f.

Next time, early in December, he defied top weight with a convincing success in the Trial for the Coral Welsh Grand National over three miles of the course. Few, though, connected with the Moore yard, including the trainer, and rider Caoilin Quinn, can have expected what was to happen on Wednesday in the Welsh Grand National proper.

I have no hesitation in naming this overwhelmingly emphatic win as the National Hunt performance of the entire year. Nineteen long-distance chasers lined up, as should be the case in a 150 grand race.  Always close to the lead over the twice-round marathon in heavy ground, Nassalam was one of perhaps half a dozen with chances as they left the back straight. Here, Quinn realised to his amazement that his mount was still cantering and didn’t want to disappoint him.

He struck for home, a move that committed what was left of the feasible opposition much earlier than their riders would have wished, and once in the straight, most were taking turns to give up. In a rare show of power and stamina, he drew remorselessly away and, by the finish, had 34 lengths in hand of the strongly fancied Iron Bridge, winner of five of his nine career starts prior to Chepstow. Third, just behind, was Iwilldoit, last year’s winner of the race by nine lengths.

When the owners were interviewed as they waited to accept the prize – never the fairest time to talk to elated connections – they were asked about Aintree, and understandably that would have to be in the thoughts of Gary Moore, with his successful negotiation of the track in the Grand Sefton, but he’ll be going up a minimum of 14lb, maybe more I guess, on top of his 145 on Wednesday.

When Corach Rambler won the race last year for Lucinda Russell, he was off 146, 20lb less than the 2022 winner Noble Yeats, whose victory under Sam Waley-Cohen had also come off 146. That one did extra well considering the rise to be fourth last year. Incidentally, Noble Yeats was beaten at odds-on returning to action for the season in a four-horse conditions hurdle race at Limerick. The system doesn’t lend itself to rewarding extravagance.

Winning the Welsh Grand National, far from indicating an automatic follow-up at Aintree, if history is to be believed, connections might be better served having a good look at the Gold Cup. The chance of the heavy ground that didn’t inhibit Nassalam here is probably unlikely, but you never know.

But the Welsh race has a very decent record in throwing up future Cheltenham Gold Cup winners, and the sort of relentless gallop shown by Nassalam this week is just the requirement for the biggest level-weights test in the calendar. I’d love him to be trained for it. If he doesn’t measure up, there’s time enough to go the big step to Aintree later, if not in 2024.

Just to name a few, Burrough Hill Lad, Master Oats, Synchronised and Native River all completed the double, winning at Cheltenham following victory in Wales.

Gary Moore had an extraordinary day on Wednesday, sweeping up the three biggest prizes for a combined figure approaching £200,000 for his owners. It started with the Finale Juvenile Hurdle at Chepstow, often one of the key races for Triumph Hurdle candidates. Many would have veered away from tackling unbeaten Burdett Road, but the Gredley family’s youngster was a late withdrawal because of the ground by trainer James Owen.

Running away from one star is not in Gary’s DNA. He ran the likewise unbeaten Salver, a gelding that had no flat-race career to call on, unlike the withdrawn theretofore favourite. A comfortable winner of his two previous starts, he ended up the 5/4 favourite and won like one, by 21 lengths.

A brother to Saldier, one of Mullins’ better hurdlers of recent times, he can go a long way and the Triumph is not looking too far off for him now. Messrs Mullins and Elliott would have been taking notes no doubt.

Then, in some ways, the crowning glory for the yard was over at Kempton, in between the two Chepstow cakewalks, when Editeur Du Gite, like Galopin Des Champs the following day, was on a career retrieval mission.

The surprise winner of last year’s Desert Orchid Chase when it was a conditions event, he now lined up under top weight for the newly installed handicap version. As with Quinn on the horses at Chepstow, Moore was happy to rely on Niall Houlihan who could claim 3lb, as was the case with Quinn in the Welsh Grand National.

The latest injury to son Jamie has thrust these two young Irishmen into the spotlight and both have come through with many excellent performances. No searching around for big-name replacements for the Moore stable. Editeur Du Gite went off in his customary place at the front and, though challenged coming to the final bend, at the finish he was well on top.

A day to remember for the stable, but for me Nassalam’s display was one I will cherish for a long time.

Happy New Year to him, and to you all!

 - TS

Early Monday Musings: Shrinkage

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I’m quite good at guessing the time as I look out of my window early in the morning, writes Tony Stafford. Yesterday, I surmised 7.24 a.m. – yes, I allowed myself a Christmas lie-in – but it was 7.26. I’d obviously miscalculated that the days were getting longer again (hurrah). The clocks will soon be going forward, too, by which time we’ll have had Cheltenham!

Then it was starting preparation for the Boxing Day cards. Last year I was swamped with the number of calls needed to the trainers on the From The Stables and Trainers Quotes services – I think we had upwards of 80 runners on the day.

This year, having spoken to Sam Stronge, who while assisting his wife Ali in running their small stable in Berkshire, is also the new Dave Roberts, agent not to A P McCoy obviously, but the man who has picked up the slack of the master jumps agent since his retirement a year or so ago.

At last count, the engaging Sam is listed as having 28 almost exclusively jumps jockeys and conditionals in his care, notably Nico De Boinville, Harry Cobden, Charlie Deutsch and Daryl Jacob. There’s some earning potential there and as he says: “It not easy to get away to the races any more”. I know how he feels, at this time of the year what with those early starts.

He did say, on hearing my early bleat about how much work there would be in compiling my information for the members: “I think there will be small fields, so it should work out quite nicely for my boys.”

How right he was. With all the meetings lost to bad weather of one type of another, but latterly mainly through waterlogging, you’d have thought there would be plenty of trainers, and especially their owners, gagging to have a runner at one of the seven UK jumps fixtures on Boxing Day (Tuesday).

They range around the country from Wincanton in the southwest; Kempton and Fontwell in the south; Market Rasen in the east; Sedgefield and Wetherby in the north and Aintree in the northwest.

So, a better geographical split than we sometimes get – viz Friday last week when Midlands trio Wolverhampton, Southwell and Uttoxeter shared the programme with Ascot. That admittedly can be and was extenuated as the BHA is providing extra all-weather action where it can to make up for other jumps cancellations.

So, what’s my point?  I said above that you’d think jumping connections would leap at the chance of having a Christmas runner after the relative blight of cancellations. In the event, there has been an uncanny correlation, both in the average number of runners per NH meeting on the day, and likewise its diminution since 2022.

Also odd, is that after all the extra all-weather cards alluded to, the sole AW programme on Boxing Day, at Wolverhampton, has a much greater number of runners than was the case last December.

When that meeting comes along every year, I never forget how I voluntarily passed up Kempton’s King George back in 1993 to attend the first-ever UK fixture held under lights at the then still shiny and relatively new Dunstall Park track, inspired by Ron Muddle and Arena, a few hundred yards from the old turf circuit where jumping had an equal share of the fixtures with the flat.

In 1993, the weather had turned cold and there were four abandonments from the nine jumps fixtures planned, with no obvious geographical bias. Ayr, Sedgefield, Hereford and Wincanton were lost. Wincanton and Sedgefield are the only two of the four still on the roster. Kempton was joined by Huntingdon, Market Rasen, Newton Abbot and Wetherby as surviving the elements.

Newton Abbot no longer races in the winter and, until this year, Huntingdon had been a staple, but Jockey Club Racecourses have jettisoned it in favour of Aintree this year. It gave JCR the opportunity to switch Sandown’s Tolworth Hurdle from there, bolstering the overall winner’s prizemoney at Aintree by 45 grand, with the inevitable sting in the tail.

Now it’s called the William Hill Formby Novices Hurdle (formerly the Tolworth Hurdle). At least it will be run with a very nice field.

Let’s return now though to Dunstall Park and 1993 when seated at my private table in the crammed to overflowing grandstand, I had the novel pleasure of my own TV set as I ate what I remember as an excellent lunch – it’s still very nice there -  while watching Barton Bank beat Bradbury Star and The Fellow to win 45k in the King George VI Chase at Kempton.

Google tells me that the 2023 equivalent after the interim inflation is £137k, so a first prize now of £142,000, courtesy Ladbrokes this time, narrowly beats that figure. If it’s possible to do it for the big races, then why not the rest?

So numerically, none of the seven NH cards on Tuesday has more than a total of 62, that honour going to Market Rasen. Last time they had 76! The smallest is Kempton with 46 compared with 59 last time, but in mitigation there was an extra race. Six and out for the punters therefore, and time to go home for the next phase of turkey consumption.

Aintree basically has taken over from fellow JCR track Huntingdon – I’ve nice memories of Boxing Day there, too. Just 51 horses in Liverpool compares with 76 at Huntingdon last year and the pattern continues at Fontwell, 74 last year, only 51 this time around. Wetherby also has a big drop, from 85 to only 53.

The other alteration is Sedgefield coming in for Newcastle. The Co Durham circuit was certainly on when Michael Dickinson had his remarkable 12 wins on the single day around the country. I had a great HWPA lunch recently, sitting for half the time next to Chris Pimlott (half a lunch with the Editor is more than enough!), who told me the maestro had only 15 runners that December day in 1982.

Chris rode a double at Market Rasen but said he had ridden a winner on the Brod Munro-Wilson-owned Talon, a horse I bought for the late, great amateur and all-round “cad” – he wouldn’t have minded me saying that – somewhere else later on. Talon was possibly the least grand of the duodectet, but we were as thrilled with that as the first of three King George wins that year of Wayward Lad (my second favourite jumper of all time after L’Escargot).

With one extra race in 2022 that averages out to eight per race, compared with 11 last year. And that’s comparing declarations and the possibility of late withdrawals with actual runners.

Prizemoney may have jumped at Aintree, even without the addition of the “George Formby”, in relation to Huntingdon, but that is not the case elsewhere. Wetherby is holding close to last year’s total, but Fontwell is down from 42k to 32k, and Sedgefield is way down on Newcastle last year – 26 grand following 43k last time at Gosforth Park. Maybe that’s why trainers and owners aren’t as bothered to leave the Christmas home comforts?

Meanwhile over in Ireland, and while I was writing this piece, the runners for the first two days of the Christmas meetings at Leopardstown and Limerick have been published. Reserves are in place for several races, but St Stephen’s Day’s (Tuesday) final declaration reveals 115 at Leopardstown and 80 at Limerick.

For Wednesday it’s respectively 93 and 83. It might be hard to beat the big three of Mullins, Elliott and De Bromhead, but there’s still plenty of other talented trainers willing to try for the massive money on offer this week.

Finally, all that remains to say is have a great and profitable Christmas. I think Dylan Cunha’s Mart (1.50 Wolverhampton) on Boxing Day will be very hard to beat.

- TS

Roving Report: It’s beginning to look a lot like Fakers

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December’s a quiet time, isn’t it? Not a lot going on, not much to do, writes David Massey. Not from a racing point of view, anyway. The days are short, which means earlier start times, which means getting up at the crack of dawn to get there, which means an early night the evening before, and usually abstaining from the bottles and bottles of Christmas booze you’ve bought for the festive period. Unless you want to work on the pitch with a sore head all day. And I don’t. 

I’ll be doing Kempton Silver Ring next week. It’ll be the first time I’ve ever worked a pitch on King George Day, so that’ll be exciting. What’s less exciting is the 5.45am alarm call to get there in time. I’ll let you know how that goes in my next missive. 

Southwell being as it is at the moment - no public, and there won’t be any for the near future, either - means my services are not always currently required at my local. It’s very quiet there, and for a recent meeting that kicked off around 11.20am, we were actually able to count the people attending (around 50) as we sat upstairs, keeping warm. 

I have, at least, had more time on my hands to go racing and get some notes down. Last week I went to Leicester, to have a look to see how Apple Away was progressing. I don’t mind a trip to Leicester, although for a track that’s only 35 miles from me, it seems to take ages to get there. Once you come off the M1, you’re in a world of pain; Fosse Park retail traffic to start with, then a whole series of traffic lights, bottlenecks and roundabouts before you get to the track. There’s not a lot to look at, either; no rolling Cotswolds to keep you calm, merely a series of Chinese takeaways, tanning salons, and Betfreds. 

The one thing I do miss about Leicester is Reg’s Beef Rolls. An absolute must in the winter months, lovely tender beef mopped up in gravy in a massive bap, all for the bargain price of a fiver. There was always a queue. 

That aside, Leicester is a perfectly nice day out. Apple Away was very good, and looks to be improving. Come the end of the day I had a little chat with Jonjo O’Neill about his in the last. Talking to Jonjo always brings a smile to your face. He gives nothing away. 

“Did you find a reason why he ran so poorly at Newbury, Jonjo?”

Jonjo looks at the horse, looks at me, and looks at the horse again. 

“Which one is this?” he says to the lass, pointing at it. I burst out laughing. 

“It’s Regal Blue”, she says. “Nothing came to light.”

“I don’t think he liked Newbury much”, says Jonjo. “Anyway, he’ll win today.” 

I’m just confused and laughing. Forty seconds ago he didn’t know which horse it was! 

He actually ran a good race, finishing third and running much better. I think he’ll win one soon. 

It was also a great pleasure to meet Malcolm Heyhoe and his partner at Leicester, both there for a day out. I’m sure older readers will remember Malcolm’s columns in the Guardian and Weekender, among others; we had a lovely chat and it turns out Malcolm’s a fan of these Geegeez scribblings. I look forward to bumping into them again in the near future.

Next stop was Cheltenham, at the weekend. On Friday I was free, so was able to do some useful paddock notes and enjoy myself, but Saturday I’d already committed to working on the rails. I found myself next to the ever-jovial Pinno, who had clearly been working on the joint I was on on the Friday. There’s always an easy way to tell; Pinno is the most untidy bookie you’ll come across. All of the previous day’s ripped-up tickets and newspaper were still in the hod, now wet from a bit of rain, and you have to clear them out before you can start. One of these days I’ll charge him for cleaning services. He always calls me “Davey Boy”; “what do you like here, Davey Boy?”, “can we get this jolly beat, Davey Boy?”, “not a lot of business about, Davey Boy”, that sort of thing. I like working next to him, he’s always good fun. 

Saturday was not busy. I was taking in the region of 600-700 a race on the rail, steady but nothing outstanding, The biggest bet I took all day was a 1000-200 Nurse Susan in the last, which won, and that sort of tells you how the whole day went. Over the 14 races on the Friday and Saturday, there were eight winning favourites and the biggest priced winner was 9-1 (Madara, I even managed to take a 900-100 that as well), and not many books were smiling as they headed to the car parks at four o’clock.  

And finally, lovely Fakenham on Tuesday. Sadly for me, my lift bailed after he’d seen the weather forecast of rain all day, so I had to drive myself on the 250-mile round trip. It’s a good job I actually like driving! 

I always keep Google Maps on to update me of any potential issues and one cropped up on the A17 near Sleaford. A lorry had come off the road and gone over into an embankment; it was lucky there was a large hedge there or he’d have gone fully over. I just about managed to creep by the accident, only to hear on the radio ten minutes later the road had been closed. That would have been game over as far as getting to Fakenham went. I often see accidents like that while on my travels and am always grateful not to be in them. 

Around 9.40 I was getting peckish and fancied a bacon sandwich, so was pleased to spy a “Hot Food Next Layby” sign near Sleaford. However, on pulling up the guy had already packed up and was preparing to tow his wares away! Either he’d had a jackpot morning or people don’t eat bacon sandwiches on the road after half nine anymore, it seems. A couple of miles down the road was “Michelles” in another layby, and she did provide an excellent bacon roll. All’s well that ends well, and I’m back on the road with a decent cup of tea to boot. 

At Fakenham, I’m working with the lovely Julie for the S&D firm and we have a fun afternoon, despite the rain. Plenty of locals have turned up and although it’s mainly small money, it’s busy enough, and the firm wins nicely on the day. Just as well, as my petrol expenses, having driven myself, are on the high side. Plus the bacon roll. The rest of the firm are off to the local Wetherspoons for their dinner, whereas I have the three-hour drive home.

The sky is a beautiful red and, as it starts to turn dark to the west and the light disappears, the colours begin to clash and I manage to get a picture as the last of the daylight goes.

I haven’t got an arty bone in my body, but I do like the snap I managed to take. I hope you do too.

On that note, I’d like to wish all Geegeez readers a merry (and profitable) Christmas and a Happy New Year!

See you all in 2024! 

- Dave M

Jockey Profiles: A General NH View

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This is the fifth article in a series on jockeys and here I’ll helicopter out to a more general perspective, writes Dave Renham. I will include data from some of the jockeys I have already looked at but will mainly introduce many new names and plenty of new stats.

As previously I have analysed National Hunt data for UK racing from 1st January 2016 to 31st October 2023. For this piece I have used a variety of data collection tools and, as with the previous four pieces, the profits/losses quoted are to Industry SP. I have quoted Betfair SP when appropriate.

All Races

Let me first share a table for all races looking at the jockeys who have the top 25 win strike rates. Jockeys who have appeared in the series to date are highlighted in green (minimum rides 800):

 

 

As the table shows, the UK jockeys on whom I’ve undertaken a deep dive are all in the top ten (top nine, to be precise). Paddy Brennan lies fourth in the table with one of the best ROI%s and a decent A/E index. He did not make the ‘cut’ for the first four articles mainly because he has ridden a lot less this year. To give you some perspective from 2016 to 2019 he averaged 470 rides a year; in 2023, at the time of my data collation at the end of October, he had ridden only 152 times. Therefore, it looks like he will barely reach 200 rides this year. It may be, then, that after around 25 years riding, Brennan is starting to wind down somewhat. Having said that, the last four seasons have seen an improvement in win success after poor campaigns for him in 2018 and 2019.

 

 

Maybe he has decided to try and ride quality over quantity as he sees out his latter years in the sport.

Aidan Coleman and Gavin Sheehan are both in top eight in the table in terms of strike rate. Coleman, at the time of writing, was still not back from a nasty injury, but he is hoping to back in the saddle before year end (though time is running out for that). One interesting stat for Aidan Coleman is that his strike rate is much higher when he rode the same horse last time out – 19.7% to be precise. When he did not ride the horse LTO this drops to 14.5%. There is also a difference in terms of ROI% of 9% (in favour of the 19.7% group).

Gavin Sheenan has one of the better ROI percentages at just under 10% losses (10p in the £), and to BSP you would have made a blind profit backing his runners to the tune of £167.87 (ROI +5.7%). He has had a couple of big BSP priced winners, but if you limit his rides to a BSP of 12.0 or shorter, he has still made a BSP profit £104.04 (ROI +5.7%). He has certainly offered punters some value in recent years. Sheehan also mirrors the stat I shared for Coleman whereby when he had ridden the horse LTO his strike rate has been 20.3%; if he did not ride the horse LTO it drops markedly to 13.2%.

Riding the favourite

Time to look at the jockeys who have performed best when on the ‘jolly’. To qualify they need to have ridden the favourite at least 70 times; again, I am sharing those with the top 25 strike rates:

 

 

David Maxwell has the higest strike rate but has proved costly to follow. He has primarily ridden in hunter chases for Paul Nicholls or Philip Hobbs. However, the contrast in results between the two is stark as the table below shows:

 

*Hobbs now trains with Johnson White

 

The Maxwell / Hobbs combination with favourites has fared extremely well, whereas the partnership with Nicholls has been surprisingly poor.

Looking at the main group of jockeys that make up the top 25, 16 of them have made a profit to SP which is impressive. To BSP this moves up to 18 with a further two hitting the break-even point. Jonathan Burke has proved profitable to SP returning nearly 18p in the £; this increases to 26p if using BSP. He has an outstanding record when riding a favourite for Harry Fry winning 18 of 33 for a strike rate just shy of 55%.

Considering that he has ridden over 900 favourites, Harry Cobden has done well to sneak into a miniscule SP profit. To BSP his profit on all favourites stands at £40.97 to £1 level stakes (ROI +4.3%).

 

Racecourse Angles

I would like now to look at some course data now. Here, I have looked at jockeys that appeared in the top three for win strike rates most frequently across all individual courses. Minimum 60 rides at each course to qualify.

 

 

The two Harry's, Cobden and Skelton, are in the top three jockey strike rates at 13 different courses each, which is impressive. Most of the big guns are near the top as you would expect. From a punting perspective, though, the jockeys who feature once or twice may potentially fly under the radar from a wagering perspective. Indeed, of the 16 jockeys that appear only once, 14 of them made a blind profit to SP, and all but one made a profit to BSP. The graph below shows the BSP profit for each jockey/course combination:

 

 

The only jockey of the 16 with losses to BSP was Sean Quinlan at Hexham (not shown in graph).

It is unlikely that these course/jockey combinations will continue to make such impressive profits, but it does show the power of perhaps steering clear of the obvious – betting against the crowd is often a good policy.

Trainer Angles

Like myself, many punters are fans of jockey/trainer partnerships, and I want to again look for potential ‘under the radar’ tie ups. In the graph below, you can see the top ten jockey/trainer combinations in terms of A/E indices. These figures are indicators of value – anything above 1.00 is considered value:

 

 

All of these jockeys have had at least 100 rides for the trainers in question and they must have combined at some point this year (2023), too. Lee Edwards riding for Adam West has produced the highest A/E index at 1.80. The breakdown of results for the pair reads 21 wins from 135 (SR 15.6%) for an SP profit of £110.33 (ROI +81.7%). To BSP the figures read +£158.79 (ROI +117.6%). Four of the past five years (2019-2023) have been profitable to SP and before then (2016-2018) Edwards rode just five times for West making yearly data effectively irrelevant.

Of these ten combinations, nine have made blind profits to SP, and all ten were profitable to BSP. Perhaps the most potent combination certainly since 2019 has been when Charlotte Jones has ridden for James Moffatt. The yearly breakdown is shown in the table below:

 

 

The last five years have produced good profits each year and although 2023 looks slightly less impressive, as I am writing this up in mid-December, Jones has had 14 more rides for Moffatt since collating the data for this article of which six have won.

It is also worth sharing the Jones/Moffatt record with horses priced 10/1 or shorter at Industry SP – this stands at 55 wins from 197 (SR 27.9%) for an SP profit of £89.21 (ROI +45.3%). Hence, although they have combined for a few big priced winners, they have also proven to be extremely successful with shorter priced runners too.

A look now at the top ten trainer/jockey pairs in terms of strike rates (100 rides minimum):

 

 

Only three of the ten have secured a profit to SP, but successful trainers and jockeys are popular with punters so obviously bookmakers are very wary, too. Hence getting value prices is not going to happen too often. In terms of BSP both Henderson/De Boinville and Richards/ Hughes have proved profitable.

The Frost/Nicholls combination has secured SP profits in six of the eight years with one breaking even. Only 2022 showed a loss but that has been reversed again in 2023 thanks to an excellent strike rate of around 28%. Also look out for when Frost was on the horse last time out as well. Her record when repeating a ride on the same Nicholls horse reads 48 wins from 172 (SR 27.9%) for a profit of £79.31 (ROI +46.1%). To BSP this improves to +£111.37 (ROI +64.8%).

*

So, there we have it. I've tried in this article to offer a selection of useful stats that you can put to work as we move into 2024. On that note, may I wish all Geegeez readers a very Happy Christmas and New Year.

- DR

Monday Musings: Geneses

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I got a parcel in the post the other day, preceded by an explanation as to why my friend Peter Ashmore would want to send me “The Boss”, written in the year 2000 by John Budden and subtitled the Life and Times of Horseracing Legend Gordon W Richards, writes Tony Stafford.

Peter knows I speak regularly with Nicky Richards, Gordon’s son and successor at Greystoke stables in Cumbria. He also thought I might find it interesting that Gordon basically was sent away from home in Bath, where he had learnt to handle all manner of horses associated with his father’s business, at the age of 11.

It intrigued Peter that young Richards’ first stop was at Sandbanks in Dorset, now the most valuable stretch of real estate, excepting certain parts of London, for instance Hampstead and Mayfair, in the UK. In 1941. When he arrived during the early stages of the Second World War, the beach was split into no-go areas by the military’s prolific use of barbed wire.

That didn’t faze Louie Dingwall, in effect and indeed practice, one of the first horserace trainers in the UK, even though it took the Jockey Club thirty years to accept that she and any other female should hold a licence, originally officially in her husband’s name.

What Peter didn’t know is that there is a small connection with me here. In the early 1970’s soon after I joined the Daily Telegraph and a few years after Mrs D, as everyone who worked for her called her, had been officially sanctioned as a trainer, I headed up a syndicate in the first horse in which I ever had an interest.

Looking in the Sporting Life, which I devoured just as I had the Greyhound Express in my first Fleet Street job a few years earlier, the racehorse sales were always an interest. I noticed that a three-year-old called Princehood had been acquired from Doncaster the day before by Mrs D for £300, or maybe even £260. I called her and asked whether she had a buyer. “Yes, my dear, me!”

As an article commissioned by the Poole Museum about this remarkable woman revealed much later, her horses usually cost £500 or under. I reckoned this impressive winner by five lengths of his debut for the classy Newmarket trainer Atty Corbett, but a disappointing fourth next time, had to be a snip. (In those days I had no idea that horses could go wrong!)

I thought putting together a syndicate (at £30 a shot!) from the paper and the reprobates, including long-term friend Trevor Halling (father of boxing commentator Nick) and band leader Chris Allen, habitués of the Corals shop across the road from the paper, would be an easy task. It wasn’t, and fifty odd years later, it still isn’t!

But in the end, we did it, and Princehood ran a few times in the name of Mrs S Carroll, a Roedean teacher who was married to my racing desk colleague, John. We were all excited and I had a couple of trips down to Sandbanks, to the stables which had its own petrol pump, a remnant of the garage she ran when she also had, among others, a successful bus business, that serviced the area.

Those days more than half a century ago, the multi-million pound properties to be were a distant illusion, but any coastal place which has water on either side of valuable land is to be treasured and that’s where we had a family lunch at Rick Stein’s restaurant a couple of years ago.

By the time I met the trainer she was already in her 80s and was poorly sighted, so that she could a couple of years earlier have driven her horsebox to Nice in the South of France and won a £6,000 prize (big money in those days) with the unconsidered veteran Treason Trail at Cagnes-sur-Mer says much for her endurance and tenacity. Then she drove it all the way back, drawing on all those days driving buses before the War.

Mrs D’s main jumps jockey in those days was the talented Gary Old, but instead of slogging through the hot Dorset summers on horseback, he used to trade that for hiring out deckchairs and his extreme good looks on the beach at Bournemouth, barely five miles along the coast.

His true potential was only really revealed when he left the Dingwall yard to join Donald Underwood near Guildford, and he had a great association with True Song, a smart hurdler who won the big novice race at Chepstow on the eve of the Cheltenham Festival. Sadly, Gary Old died very young.

Another Sandbanks inmate was Pat Butler, whose time there didn’t exceed Princehood’s by long as he has been training in his own right in Sussex since 1976. When we bump into each other on the racecourse, Pat always reminds me of those distant days.

Princehood left to join Ken Payne when he moved from the New Forest to Middleham and broke the 5f track record at Lanark at 14/1 as we looked on in concerted disbelief in the Kings and Keys pub. Two days earlier we were all on when he got stuffed in a seller at Doncaster.

When I began today’s jaunt I had intended to give rather more prominence to the journey Gordon Richards made to the top of the jumping tree. As when in his early days as an apprentice jockey with the Tom Waugh stable at Chilton, the clerk of the scales asked his name. “Gordon Richards”, he replied. “I don’t think we can have two Gordon Richards”, was the clerk’s response, referring to the perennial champion who set even greater records than Tony McCoy’s over jumps as the leading flat jockey either side of and during WW2.

Young Gordon was asked who he worked for and when he replied, “Mr Waugh”, Gordon W Richards was born, never to be altered for the rest of his highly-successful life and career.

Reading John Budden’s studiously researched missive, understandable as his original occupation was as a schoolteacher in Cumbria, for me it was a series of human and equine names that also exactly mirrored the most active of my betting days.

Names like Playlord, the horse that got him going in Yorkshire and enabled him to take the Greystoke stables across in Cumbria previously the home of Tommy Robson, through to Noddy’s Ryde and after that many more, lastly in Gordon’s life, One Man, the enigma that could win any race – apart from the Cheltenham Gold Cup – provided vivid reminders of those days.

The brushes with authority were detailed, often with some humour, as he always stood his ground and supported his jockeys. But then came the gradual and eventually rapid decline in his health, which meant Nicky had to take control. He has done so with great skill and dedication for 25 years already – and he’s now approaching, unbelievably, the age his father was when he died from cancer in 1998.

John Budden, known as Lord John Budden in the press rooms in the north of England for his plummy tones, used that term to describe the great radio commentator Peter Bromley. John also commentated in points and under Rules and was a very popular man with colleagues and professionals in the sport. He was a good tipster to boot and wrote for the Cumberland News from 1966 until his death last year. Dedication indeed.

There were parallels with my other much treasured book that ended in a similar period. Horsetrader, subtitled Robert Sangster and the Rise and Fall of the Sport of Kings, was written by Patrick Robinson with (no relation) Nick Robinson as early as 1993, yet it has become such a must-read that it has been re-printed and also voiced as an audio book.

I have my old copy and find that the events chronicled therein ended as far back as 1993! As with The Boss’s joint-author, Nick Robinson died only recently, in his case this summer aged 87. He was a major influence in the development of syndicate ownership, through Kennet Valley Thoroughbreds which continues to thrive under Nick’s protégé, Sam Hoskins.

It was Robinson, in a coffee shop in Liverpool attended regularly by sons of wealthy businessmen in the Liverpool area, that first whetted the young Robert Sangster’s appetite for horse racing.

The book details how winning (and losing) gambles gradually persuaded the son of the founder and chairman of Vernons Pools, in the days when football pools were the only way for the public to land onto massive riches. That was before even Premium Bonds (launched in 1957) and the lottery in the UK, although Ireland’s lottery was the driving force behind upgrading the Irish Sweeps Derby in the early 1960’s.

Sangster, off his own bat, studied his new-found obsession and decided Vincent O’Brien was the best trainer and acted on his opinion. Decades later, Robert, Vincent, and Vincent’s son-in-law John Magnier, ruled the world of horse racing.

Without Robinson there wouldn’t have been a Sadler’s Wells, thus Galileo and Frankel. It all came down to that coffee shop!

Just as Nicky Richards has assimilated the skills of his father, The Boss, so Robert Sangster’s sons and grandsons have made their mark either as breeders, owners, bloodstock agents or, in the case of grandson Ollie, an emerging trainer. A rich legacy indeed!

Horsetrader’s conclusion is that the arrival of the free-spending Arab owners altered the equilibrium, we thought once and for all. But look at racing in 2023, thirty years after Horsetrader’s publication, Coolmore stills thrives in its modified form, and while Arab owners are still very much in evidence, the growing threat and indeed the money to sustain it now comes from Japan.

That is epitomised by the brilliant Equinox, highest-rated horse in the world and about to service his first book of mares, including the wonderful Japanese champion Almond Eye.

They certainly adhere to the old racing adage, breed the best to the best and hope for the best. Then again, Coolmore, 30 years on from Horsetrader’s publication, might say that in daringly sending Rhododendron to mate with Deep Impact in Japan and getting Auguste Rodin they weren’t far off!

- TS

Jockey Profiles: Brian Hughes & Sam Twiston-Davies

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This is the fourth article in a series looking at the performance of some of top National Hunt jockeys. In this one I will be looking at Sam Twiston-Davies and Brian Hughes. Previously I've looked at:

Nico de Boinville and Harry Cobden

Harry Skelton and Sean Bowen

Rachael Blackmore, Paul Townend and Jack Kennedy

I have analysed NH data for UK racing from 1st Jan 2016 to 31st Oct 2023. The main vehicle for my data gathering has been the Geegeez Query Tool, but I have also used the Geegeez Profiler when required. All the profits/losses quoted are to Industry SP, but I will quote Betfair SP where appropriate. All the tables include A/E indices. In addition, when data has been pulled from the Geegeez Profiler Tool, I have also shared PRB figures (Percentage of Rivals Beaten).

Let's start with Sam Twiston-Davies.

Sam Twiston-Davies Overall Record

Let me first share Sam's overall stats by looking at his performance on every runner during the period of study:

 

 

On average Twiston-Davies rides around 650 times a year, which is much higher than any jockey I have looked at to date. His figures are reasonable, winning on roughly one in six rides, with a PRB figure of 0.56; but his A/E index is just below ‘average’ for all jockeys. Losses to SP stand at just over 21p in the £. This drops to 9p in the £ to BSP.

 

Sam Twiston-Davies Record by Year

Let's see what the yearly stats show. Here is a breakdown by both win, and win/placed (Each Way) percentage / Strike Rate (SR%):

 

 

As the graph indicates, his best two years in terms of win and each way percentage were in 2016 and 2017. This is because he was riding regularly for Paul Nicholls then and 42% of his rides in those two seasons were for the Ditcheat trainer. 2020 to 2022 showed a dip in overall performance but this year (2023) to date has been much better hitting the mid-17% mark.

 

Sam Twiston-Davies Record by Month

Here is a breakdown of his record by month using win strike rate:

 

 

August and September are the best months, while June to September are the best four. The EW (win and placed) strike rates correlate well with June to September seeing SR%s over 40% - the remaining eight months are in the 30s ranging from 31.2% to 38.3%. While it is material that field sizes are at their smalles in NH racing between May and September, concentrating on August and September, and if we focus on horses priced 11/2 or shorter, we almost get to a break-even scenario to SP: 96 wins from 311 qualifiers (SR 30.9%) for a small loss of £4.83 (ROI -1.6%). To BSP that would have turned a small profit of £17.55 (ROI + 5.6%).

 

Sam Twiston-Davies Record by Betting Odds / Price (SP)

Now a look at the results by splitting them into different price bands:

 

 

The 'evens or less' group have incurred the least losses to SP, and all other groups have seen losses (ROI) of more than 10p in the £. Horses priced in double figures look best left alone on every measure.

 

Sam Twiston-Davies Record by Distance

Moving on now to distance metrics and Sam's record at different distances. I have grouped them into the same four distance bands as in prior articles and below is a graph looking at the win and each way strike rates:

 

 

This graph shows that the shorter the distance the better for Twiston-Davies in terms of strike rate. If we look at the PRB figures (Percentage of Rivals Beaten) they correlate with the win/EW strike rates:

 

 

The two mile and shorter group have also produced the smallest losses to SP and a better A/E index of 0.90.

 

Sam Twiston-Davies Record by Race type

Next under the microscope is ST-D's record by race code/type:

 

 

The hurdle and chase results are virtually a carbon copy of each other in terms of strike rate, ROI% and A/E indices. The NH flat races show a very high A/E index, but this is not reflected in the profit/loss figures. For the record, Twiston-Davies has ridden in six hunter chases (no wins).

 

Sam Twiston-Davies Record by Racecourse

I am now going to look at all courses where Twiston-Davies has had at least a hundred rides during the study period. The courses are split into two graphs alphabetically and the win strike rate at each course is shown:

 

 

 

There is quite a range here going from Sandown at 7.4% win rate up to Hereford at 25.6%. His record at Hereford has been excellent with decent profits to SP of £65.51 (ROI +54.1%). The A/E index stands at a very healthy 1.31 and the PRB figure is 0.61. In six of the eight years, Sam's strike rate at the track has exceeded 20% and in five of the eight he has secured a profit.

Fontwell is another course where he has performed well, showing a small blind profit. In chases at the West Sussex track, he has excelled winning 18 of 54 (SR 33.3%) for an SP profit of £19.30 (ROI +35.7%). Indeed, his last six chase rides (up to the time of writing) have been as follows:

 

 

That's six wins in a row with six different trainers!

In contrast he has struggled at Sandown and Newbury, while it has not been easy to get on the board at Aintree or Cheltenham either, though in the latter cases that is true for almost all jockeys.

 

Sam Twiston-Davies Record by Trainer

Here is a list of trainers for whom Twiston-Davies has ridden at least 80 times for during the period of study. It should be noted that he has had only two rides for Nicholls in the past 24 months.

 

 

His record for Charlie Longsdon is surprisingly poor. Only one trainer was in profit, namely Neil Mulholland, but that is entirely down to a 100/1 winner. With Sam Thomas, the Sam combo has done particularly well in chases hitting a better than 27% win rate and edging into a small profit. His record when riding for his father Nigel is not as good as I had expected with quite significant losses of 27p in the £.

 

Sam Twiston-Davies Record by Class of Race

It is time to breakdown Sam's performance now by class of race:

 

 

Class 1 races have the lowest strike rate as one might expect, while Class 3 and 4 races have produced the highest strike rates. A profit has been made in both Class 5 and 6 races, but these figures are skewed a little by a couple of big-priced winners.

 

Sam Twiston-Davies Record by Run Style

Finally on Sam T-D, let me look at his run style splits in terms of win percentages:

 

 

The usual pattern we are used to manifests once more: the nearer to the front he rides early, the better. Twiston-Davies has performed slightly better on hurdling front runners than chasing ones in terms of win percentage - 28% v 24%.

If we examine the A/E figures we can see that they correlate with the win strike rate data as the following chart shows:

 

 

The 'led' A/E index is very solid at 1.00 which suggests these runners are edging towards ‘value’. Horses that raced mid-division or further back early offered punters poor value.

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

 

 

Front-running favourites proved profitable if your crystal ball was in reliable working order, whereas held up favourites lost a whopping 31p in the £.

 

**

Brian Hughes Overall Record

It is time to switch to three-time NH Champion Jockey Brian Hughes and we'll start by looking at his record on all horses in all UK NH races:

 

 

At first glance these figures are slightly better than for Twiston-Davies and, amazingly, he has ridden around 1500 more horses. Indeed, Hughes and Twiston-Davies are the two jockeys who have ridden the most in the UK going back to 2016. Hughes tends to ply his trade mainly in the North as the pie chart below shows. It shows the percentage of rides by region:

 

 

74% of Hughes' rides have come at northern English tracks or in Scotland. He ventures south rarely with just 3% of his total rides being at southern tracks.

Now it is time to break down his data, firstly by year.

Brian Hughes Record by Year

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

 

 

As the graph shows, Hughes has managed a win strike rate of 16% or more in seven of the eight years, with the other year (2017) just below at 15.8. Overall, his performance year in year out has been quite consistent. There is a difference of only 4.4% between the highest yearly EW SR% and the lowest yearly one.

Brian Hughes Record by Betting Odds / Price (SP)

Let us see whether any market / price patterns can be found by breaking down his results by Starting Price bands:

 

 

The 16/1 or bigger horses look a ‘no no’, while those priced between 11/10 and 13/8 have produced the best returns; but there doesn't seem to be any SP bias going on here.

 

Brian Hughes Record by Distance

A dive next into Brian's record at different distances. I have grouped them into the same four distance bands I did earlier and am looking at the win and each way strike rates:

 

 

There does seem a clear distance bias here with the longest distance band of three miles or more performing well below the other three distance groupings. In these longer races Hughes has seen losses equating to 32p in the £, compared with the 2m1f-2m2f losses of just 9p in the £. It is time to look at the PRB figures now:

 

 

As the table shows the PRB figures correlate well with the win and each way strike rates, with performance much stronger to around two and a half miles and dropping off thereafter.

 

Brian Hughes Record by Race type

Now let's analyse Hughes' record in hurdle races, chases and in bumpers:

 

 

Chases and hurdle races offer extremely similar looking stats as far as strike rate ROI, and A/E are concerned. The results in bumpers (NH Flat) are slightly better. There is a big difference in these bumpers results when comparing male horses to female horses:

 

 

Males have outperformed females by nearly 8% in terms of strike rate, the A/E indices also strongly favour males as does the ROI%. Losses of just 8p in the £ for males compared with nearly 36p for female runners. It's hard to explain this disparity (the overall difference in bumpers is males 11.6% win and females 9.1%), and it might simply be down to a quirk of the relatively small female sample size.

Before moving on, it may or may not be worth noting that Hughes has ridden in five hunter chases, winning one.

 

Brian Hughes Record by Racecourse

Below is a table of all tracks where Hughes has had at least 100 rides. The courses are listed alphabetically:

 

 

Given his total number of rides, it should come as no surprise that Hughes has ridden over 100 times at so many different tracks. Aintree has not been a particularly successful hunting ground, nor has Haydock. Three courses have edged into a blind profit – Bangor, Southwell, and Stratford. Of those three, the Stratford stats are the most solid as Hughes has been profitable when focusing in on horses racing there that started in the top three in the betting. This subset of runners has won 25 from 87 (SR 28.7%) for a profit of £4.95 (ROI +5.7%).

The Musselburgh stats are strong, too, with a near break-even scenario. Again, focusing on horses from the top three in the betting at the Scottish track we get the following results: 80 wins from 260 rides (SR 30.8%) for a small SP profit of £7.49 (ROI +2.9%). Market Rasen and Worcester are two other venues where Hughes has made a profit with runners from the top three in the betting.

 

Brian Hughes Record by Trainer

During the period of study, Hughes has 100-plus rides with eleven trainers – one of these, Keith Dalgleish, has taken a sabbatical so here are the stats for the other ten:

 

 

Hughes is stable jockey for Donald McCain, and they have combined to hit a better than one-in-five win rate. The PRB figure of 0.60 is also noteworthy. With McCain his record has been better in hurdle races and the pair have combined to profitable effect at BSP over the smaller obstacles. There are three courses to note when Hughes is on a McCain runner – Bangor, Musselburgh, and Perth. All three have produced excellent win strike rates (27.9%, 27.2% and 32.8%), and all have provided SP profits.

Brian Ellison, James Ewart, Charlie Longsdon and Nicky Richards are four other trainers for whom he has performed well.

 

Brian Hughes Record by Class of Race

It is time to breakdown his performance now by class of race:

 

 

As we have often seen during this series, Class 1 races have produced the poorest results. Outside of the top level, Hughes has been consistent regardless of class bracket.

 

Brian Hughes Record by Run Style

The final stop is run style starting with the splits in terms of win percentages:

 

 

A near 30% strike rate on front runners continues the theme we have consistently seen throughout this series of articles. Backing all Hughes hold up runners would have set you back nearly 40p in the £.

Hughes' A/E indices by run style show a similar pattern although there is little in it between the prominent and mid-division groups:

 

 

Finally, let me share his run style win percentages when riding the favourite:

 

 

Incredibly, Hughes-ridden favourites which led have won more often than now and would have yielded a good profit if predicted pre-race. Held up jollies incurred painful losses of over 33%.

Main Takeaways

It is time to bring this fourth National Hunt jockey article to a close but before doing so, below is a table featuring some of the main takeaways to note regarding Sam Twiston-Davies and Brian Hughes. I hope I have uncovered some useful angles, both positive and negative for both jockeys.

Good luck.

- DR

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