Friday is Horses For Courses (H4C) report day at Geegeez and this feature does exactly what you'd expect, as it shows the full course history since 2009 of any horse running that has previously had a run at that track, sorted by number of wins, but this can be changed to any column at your discretion.
As well as today’s race time, course, horse name, jockey and trainer name, there is a breakdown of runs, wins and places, and profit and loss calculations for both win and each way betting. And as with all Geegeez reports, there is a ‘Today’ and a ‘Tomorrow’ (for the next day’s racing) view.
HINT: Layers might like to look towards the lower end of the report, for those with negative performance at the track, but please refer to our User Guide for further information.
My chosen settings for the report...
...have sadly yielded no qualifiers for Friday, but I can, of course, always fall back upon our daily list of 'free' races...
- 2.55 Doncaster
- 3.40 Sandown
- 4.15 Sandown
- 5.55 Bellewstown
- 6.40 Haydock
- 8.10 Beverley
...where the second of the two Sandown contests is a competitive-looking, small field, Class 1 contest, so let's look at the 4.15 Sandown, a 5-runner, Listed flat race for horses aged 3 and above. The trip is a right-handed 1m2f on good/good to soft ground and here's the field...
All five actually raced against each other last time out and that was in the Listed Wolferton Stakes over this trip at Royal Ascot seventeen days ago, where Saga was well clear of the others...
...beating Notre Belle Bete and Certain Lad by 7.5 and 8.5 lengths respectively with Poker Face and Savvy Victory a further 2 and 17.25 lengths back. That doesn't however tell the full story as only Saga really ran his own race and benefited from the three lowest drawn runners finishing in the first five home. Certain Lad and Savvy Victory were both hampered, although odds of 50/1 and 100/1 suggest they were never winning.
So, none won last time out, but Notre Belle Bete won three starts ago, Poker Face won the first three of his six outings to date and Savvy Victory won seven starts ago. Certain Lad last won eight races back and Saga's sole win from eleven efforts came on just his third appearance 22 months ago.
All five have, however, won over this trip, but none have raced here at Sandown before and they all raced in this grade 17 days ago!
CERTAIN LAD won a Group 3 contest on good to soft ground at York in August 2020 and ended his 2022 campaign with a decent third of ten in a Haydock Group 3 event. he returned to action in May of this year after 279 days off to run a creditable 3rd in a soft ground Class 2 handicap at Chester prior to his run in the Wolferton, where he was badly hampered.
NOTRE BELLE BETE started 2022 with a sequence reading 11913, but then lost his way under increasing weight before the addition of cheekpieces in November seemed to spark a renaissance and prior to the Wolferton LTO, his form in the cheekpieces read 22313, including winning a valuable Class 2 handicap at Newcastle on Good Friday. Transferring that form to the turf would be useful, but he is 0 from 15 on the Flat as opposed to 4 from 8 on the A/W.
POKER FACE is a lightly-raced (6 starts) 4 yr old who won his first three outings (2 x C5 & 1 @ C4), before a six month break last winter. He returned to action in April and was only headed inside the final furlong of the Gr3 Earl of Sefton Stakes at Newmarket, eventually finishing second. He faded late on next time out too, when trying to win a Gr2 at Chester from the front and has only raced at Royal Ascot since.
SAGA has made the frame in five of his ten Flat runs, but has only won a 7f, Class 3 maiden so far. That said, he only just failed (by a head) to win the 30-runner Britannia Stakes at Ascot a year ago and went down by the same margin at Newmarket in another Class 2 heritage handicap two starts ago. that was his first run for seven months and then ran really well at Ascot last time out, taking advantage of the low draw.
SAVVY VICTORY won over today's trip last April & August and was a length and a half clear of Certain Lad at Chester in May, when finishing second of nine at Chester, although Certain Lad was racing for the first time in over nine months. He was badly hampered in the Wolferton last time out, but has no real Class 1 form and arguably the weakest here on paper.
There is a suggestion that the course might dry out a little so for our view of Instant Expert, I've included form for both Good ground as well as Good/Good to Soft...
Notre Belle Bete's figures were always going to be poor, as he's 0 from 15 on turf, so we'll check the place stats shortly and the field's lack of success at Class 1 confirms my belief that is only Class 2 standard. Three of these have at least won on good to soft and Savvy Victory probably won't want it to dry out. Those place stats I mentioned look like this...
...suggesting that most of them will be happy if the groundstaff continue to water the track as they have been doing and based on the above, Poker Face probably edges the race for a place. As you'd expect with such a small field, there's no real advantage to be gained from the draw...
...although those drawn higher tend to make the frame more often and the PRB3 data points towards the higher draw again...
...so that's more good news for Poker Face. The pace breakdown of those races above show that hold-up horses are at a disadvantage here...
...with those racing further forward more likely to fill the frame. Sadly there's not much early pace in this field based on recent evidence and it might well be left to Poker Face to set the fractions again, as he did at Chester recently...
...whilst our pace/draw heat map seems to everyone a chance here, although Saga looks worst off...
Summary
I expect a cagey affair here with no real pace angle and a look at the market at 4pm had Saga as the 5/4 favourite some way clear of next best Poker Face at 11/4. Poker Face is the one that has ticked most boxes for me during my analysis and I'd much rather back a horse at 11/4 who has two decent group runs behind him than a 5/4 fav who is 1 from 10 on the turf. Obviously, if this pans out like the Wolferton did, then it's Saga's race to win/lose, but I'd rather side with Poker Face here.
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- Tix Picks, Saturday 04/01/25
- Tix Picks, Friday 03/01/25
- Tix Picks, Thursday 02/01/25
- Tix Picks, Tuesday 31/12/24
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