Apologies for a lack of a column from me yesterday, I was ultimately defeated by technology, logistics and time.
Friday's free feature, the Horses for Courses (H4C) report does exactly what it says on the tin ie it shows the full course history since 2009 of any horse running that has previously had a run at the track and is 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 as ever please refer to our User Guide for further information!
My own settings (you get to choose your own parameters) for the H4C report...
...are quite restrictive and have, sadly, produced no qualifiers, but our daily feature is always supplemented by a number of 'free' racecards...
- 4.20 Ascot
- 4.45 Redcar
- 6.40 Musselburgh
- 7.05 Newmarket
- 7.10 Down Royal
- 7.45 Down Royal
...from which the first on the list is clearly the pick, but Matt's team of assembled experts are previewing elsewhere on the site, so this humble little column will turn its attention to Flat Racing HQ for the 7.05 Newmarket, a 9-runner, Class 4, 3yo flat handicap over a right-handed 1m2f on good/good to firm ground...
Top weight Greysful Storm and the fast finishing Never Ending both won last time out, but the former does now step up a class, as do Golspie and The Jackler, whilst bottom weight Golden Maverick is up two classes.
We've quite a few that are unxposed in handicaps with this being a handicap debut for Golspie, Never Ending and The Jackler, whilst it's only Feud's second attempt.
He's also been off the track the longest, but a 7-week break shouldn't be the reason he can't win here and the rest of the field have all had near enough a fortnight or more to recover from their last run.
The top two on the card are the only ones to have won at this trip and none of the nine have won here before, as shown on Instant Expert, which also shows 3 winners on similar ground conditions and four Class 4 winners...
There's not much data there for us to build up a clear enough picture, so we should switch to the place stats...
...which lead me to suggest that Feud, The Jackler and Golden Maverick won't be featuring much in my thoughts from this point forward. Removing those three from the equation also takes away the two widest drawn runners, which might not be a bad thing based on these draw stats...
...that point to the first four stalls being the preferred place to run from...
...which would be good news for Mighty River, Never Ending and Golspie who occupy the first three stalls. The pace stats for those same races then go on to say that the chances of winning this race increase the further forward a horse runs and that those racing prominently actually make the frame slightly more often than leaders. Based on the field's last few runs...
...I'd expect Mighty River to be bang up with the pace as he shoots out of stall 1 and this pace/draw combination represents the best chance for horses to win here...
Summary
Low draw and fast starts are the order of the day here and that's Mighty River. He's in good nick (2nd over this trip on the Rowley LTO) and has won at the trip, so he'd be the one to beat for me. If he does get out quickly, I suspect he might well drag Never Ending along with him, whilst further down the draw order, the in-form Island Star could very well have something to say in the outcome.
No odds available at 3.10pm on Thursday, so I'll revisit later when I check the price of possible E/W runner John Chard VC who has led in a couple of his last four outings.
Mighty River and John Chard VC opened up at 7/1 and 12/1 respectively, which were decent enough prices IMO.
Other Recent Posts by This Author:
- Tix Picks, Saturday 04/01/25
- Tix Picks, Friday 03/01/25
- Tix Picks, Thursday 02/01/25
- Tix Picks, Tuesday 31/12/24
- Tix Picks, Monday 30/12/24
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