Racing Insights, Friday 09/06/23

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 yielded just one qualifier for this Friday...

...but thankfully I can also fall back upon our daily list of 'free' races...

2.50 Market Rasen
3.10 Thirsk
4.55 Bath
6.15 Clonmel
7.35 Goodwood
8.10 Goodwood

...and the first of those 'free' races looks the best standard on paper, so we're off to Lincolnshire for the 2.50 Market Rasen, an 11-runner, Class 2, 4yo+ handicap hurdle over a right-handed 2m5½f (after a +216 yard rail adjustment!) on good ground...

As ever, I'll approach this in the same way I taught my children to solve maths problems : list the details you already know! And for us that means taking the data presented to us on the racecard, starting with FORM...

...where King Alexander comes here seeking a hat-trick, whilst Mullinaree completed that feat last time out and now seeks a fourth win on the bounce. Elsewhere Hang In There has 5 wins and two runner-up finishes from his last nine runs and only three (Luttrell Lad, Celestial Horizon and Didtheyleaveuoutto) are on long losing runs, having lost their last 11, 7 and 16 races respectively!

The next thing I consider is CLASS and only four of these (Hang In There, Earlofthecotswolds, Impulsive One & Luttrell Lad) raced at this Class 2 level LTO witht he first named a runner-up at Aintree in a better race than this. Of the other seven, only The Wounded Knee drops in class, after being pulled up in a Grade 2 Novice hurdle at Kelso three months ago, whilst Celestial Horizon, Didtheyleaveuoutto and Sacre Coeur all step up from Class 3 and with Celestial Horizon and Didtheyleaveuoutto both being on lengthy losing runs, it's tough to see the step up in class helping them here. Mind you, it could be worse, because King Alexander, Mullinaree and Runswick Bay are all up two classes, but at least that first pair are in good form.

At this point, I then like to check if there's ANYTHING NEW going on with the runners that might affect their performance and there's a fair bit here, as Impulsive One, The Wounded Knee and Sacre Coeur are all making debuts for their new yards and it'll be just the second handicap outing for The Wounded Knee, as it will be for King Alexander, who is 2 from 2 since a wind op, a fact that will hearten connections of Sacre Coeur and Runswick bay as those horses now run for the first time since their own surgeries. Slightly less invasive for Luttrell Lad, though, as he just has a first-time tongue tie in place.

COURSE/DISTANCE form is very important too and Hang In There, Earlofthecotswolds and Luttrell Lad have all won won here before (in a 2m6½f chase, 2m5f hurdle and a 2m1f bumper respectively), whilst Hang In There, Earlofthecotswolds, Impulsive One, King Alexander and Runswick Bay have all won over a similar trip to this one.

And the last thing I tend to look at on the racecard is the number of DAYS SINCE LAST RUN, as we don't really want rusty horses coming off long layoffs or those turned back out too quickly and we thankfully have neither here. Sacre Coeur and The Wounded Knee have been rested for 99 and 97 days respectively, but that's not excessive, whilst all their rival have had at least a couple of weeks' rest to freshen up.

I would then turn to the excellent INSTANT EXPERT feature for some some more data and as you'll see below, some of these have got some decent NH numbers behind them and Sacre Coeur is the only one yet to win on good ground (her only win was on soft ground three starts ago). Five of this field have already won a Class 2 contest (six have actually won at Class 1!) and only Celestial Horizon has yet to score over a trip of 2m4f to 2m6f...

...and the traffic light system used above should be pretty self-explanatory, but the rating column might not. Essentially T = today's official rating ie a horse's mark and L is the runner's last winning mark and the standout figure is that 21lb difference for The Wounded Knee, who won a Class 4 handicap hurdle at Perth off a mark of 108 nine months ago, but is now rated at 129, which looks punitive to me. Didtheyleaveuoutto may have won twice at this grade, but a 20% strike rate isn't good and allied to his recent poor form and a 1in 7 record at similar trips, you'd be brave to back him here.

Based on everything I've put down so far, these are now the runners that I'd want to choose from...

...and I'd then focus on handicap hurdle form...

...and eliminate Runswick Bay from my list. The in-form pair of King Alexander and Mullinaree are untried at class/trip, as both step up in grade here and whilst they're definite contenders here, it's the top pair on the card catching the eye from Instant Expert. From here, we normally then look at the draw, the pace stats and how they work together, but there is no draw in an NH contest, of course, so let's head directly to the PACE data we hold under in our Pace Analyser tool...

...which says that similar races here in the past have been most beneficial to front-runners and that blindly backing known front-runners could turn a profit. Known hold-up types are generally to be avoided here and based off recent outings this wouldn't seem to apply to my 'final five'...

Summary

King Alexander, Mullinaree and Hang In There bring the best form to the table, but the first pair are both up two grades, whilst the latter has scored at both track and trip, albeit on different days! Hang In There also caught the eye on Instant Expert, along with Earlofthecotswolds and it is this pair who seem best suited by the pace profile required here. All of which suggests that Impulsive One is the most vulnerable of my five and that I prefer Hang In There and Earlofthecotswolds over the LTO winners King Alexander and Mullinaree.

Hang In There makes more appeal to me as the winner here based on recent form and the 6/1 offered by Hills at 4.45pm looks a bit big, so I'd take that. Earlofthecotswolds is 15/2, which is probably about right and is borderline E/W territory for me, but he has a great chance of making the frame and if I had to choose between King Alexander and Mullinaree, I'd probably side with the former, King Alexander, who is the early 11/4 fav. His win LTO was more impressive than Mullinaree's and the latter is now worse off at the weights. I'm leaving him out of my 1-2-3, but I reckon he won't be far away.

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