Racing Insights, Wednesday 15/03/23
A nice 11/1 placer and near 12/1 tricast/trifecta from the opening day of the Festival on Tuesday warmed things up for me nicely, but back to business now.
Wednesday's free Geegeez GOLD feature, the Trainer Statistics (TS) report is, in fact, four reports in one. It contains information on a trainer’s recent form, and their longer term course form. For each of 14 day, 30 day, course one year, and course five year, users can filter by runs, wins, places, win profit/loss and each way profit/loss. Clicking on any row in the report will reveal the runners that trainer has entered on the day in question, and clicking on the runner row will open that race in a new tab.
HINT: It can help to cross refer the profit figures of the trainer with their win/place percentage. A few big priced winners can mean a trainer has a high profit number but a low strike rate. You may need to be very patient, and a bit lucky, to come out in front this way!
[ Please refer to our User Guide for further information ]
In addition to the free daily feature, we always open up a number of racecards to non-Gold subscribers and for Wednesday, they are...
- 2.10 Cheltenham
- 6.00 Kempton
- 6.15 Newcastle
- 7.15 Newcastle
My own personal settings for the TS report...
...have, sadly, generated no runners for me to consider, so I'm going to take a look at the last of the 'free' races, the 7.15 Newcastle, an 8-runner, Class 4, 4yo+ A/W handicap over a straight 7f on standard going tapeta...
My initial thoughts were that this would be a contest between Justcallmepete, Walking On Clouds and Lord Rapscallion, but let's see what the card and tools us. None of the field won last time out, but Alexander James was a runner-up and Walking On Clouds, Lord Rapscallion & Swiss Ace all finished third, whilst Justcallmepete, Walking On Clouds, Lord Rapscallion and Abnaa have all won at least two of their last five outings.
Justcallmepete, Lord Rapscallion and Abnaa all drop in class to run here with the other five all have raced at this grade LTO. Both Swiss Ace and Abnaa are note as fast finishers and Archduke Ferdinand makes both a handicap and a UK debut after racing to some success in Sweden, although he was disqualified in each of his last two runs for 'medical irregularities'.
He's also likely to need the run after 199 days off track whilst all his rivals have been seen in the last 1 to 3 weeks and he's up against three former course and distance winners in the shape of Swiss Ace, Gobi Sunset and Abnaa. Alexander James and Walking On Clouds have both won here over a mile and 6f respectively whilst Archduke Ferdinand won over 7f on dirt in Sweden and Lord Rapscallion has a couple of Chelmsford 7f successes to his name.
Instant Expert, as ever, has all the relevant form under these conditions...
...where aside from failing to make the frame on his only previous visit to Newcastle, Lord Rapscallion catches the eye and it should be said that his previous run here was at Class 2 over two years ago! Justcallmepete gets the going, but has a poor record at 7f and the same can be said about Walking On Clouds too, but if we look at place form, there's a school of thought that he might be better than those numbers...
Unusually for a straight 7f track, we do have a bit of a draw bias here...
...where it has been advantageous to be drawn in the higher half of the draw, which will be music to the ears of those following Walking On Clouds and if you can get a high draw here, the prescribed tactics are to race prominently tucked in behind the leader(s), according to the heat map...
...and that's because those races above that we used for the draw stats have been won as follows...
Walking On Clouds is unlikely to race prominently though, as his average pace score from his last four outings suggests more of a mid-division position, but at a 15% strike rate the high draw/mid-div combo doesn't do too shabbily. The stats suggest Lord Rapscallion will keep him company, whilst Abnaa sits out back in a race that Gobi Sunset is likely to set the tempo...
...and if we transpose our horses' running styles onto that heatmap...
...you'd probably say Gobi Sunset from a low draw and Swiss Ace/Walking On Clouds from the higher stalls as the ones catching the eye.
Summary
I started off with the thought that this would be a contest between (in racecard order) Justcallmepete, Walking On Clouds & Lord Rapscallion and it was those three plus Abnaa who have been in the best recent form. Lord Rapscallion was the first to emerge from Instant Expert, but when we looked at place form, both Gobi Sunset and Walking On Clouds came to the fore.
The draw seems to favour Walking On Clouds, Swiss Ace and possibly Abnaa, whilst Swiss Ace probably had the best pace profile and it was he, Gobi Sunset and Walking On Clouds I noted from the pace/draw heatmap.
So what does that mean? Well, it means that purely on form/namechecks, I'd be siding with Walking On Clouds with Lord Rapscallion as next best. As for another for the frame/tricast etc, it's any of Justcallmepete, Abnaa, Gobi Sunset and Swiss Ace and I think that Abnaa might just be the one. He's down in class, gets weight all round, he's a fast finisher and won over course and distance three starts ago. As along as he's not too far off the pace, he could fly home and grab a place, making a nice 11/1 E/W bet if you're so inclined.
As for my 1-2, Walking On Clouds is a 9/2 shot, which is fair and Lord Rapscallion is an equally fairly priced 8/1. also good for E/W punters.
