Racing Insights, Wednesday 15/05/2024
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...
- 3.45 York
- 5.10 Sligo
- 6.15 Sligo
- 6.22 Perth
- 6.40 Bath
My own personal settings for the TS report...
...have highlighted the following runners...
...from which we should really go to York! However, I'll leave the Musidora (3.45 race) to those better qualified elsewhere on the site and the two Jack Channon horses go in fields of 14 and 22. One of those is pushing my comfort zone boundaries and one is way beyond, so taking the lesser of two evils, I'll go with the 2.15 York, a 14-runner, Class 2, 4yo+ flat handicap over a left-handed 1m4f on good to firm ground...
I actually picked Jack Channon's runner, Flash Bardot as my winner for last Saturday's Racing Insights, but she was withdrawn. She still arrives here as one of just two LTO winners (Crystal Delight being the other) in the field and this sole mare has won three of her last four. Elsewhere Chillingham, Two Brothers and bottom weight Lightening Company were all in the frame, but the latter is winless in nine races and Chillingham has lost eight on the bounce (placed five times, though) since three wins and a place from his first five starts. The rest of the field have all won at least one of their last seven.
Klondike's last run was group 3 race at Newbury, so he's down in class here for his handicap debut, but Flash Bardot, Two brothers and Saratoga Gold all step up from Class 3. Chillingham wears cheekpieces for the first time today and it'll be Percy Shelley's debut in a hood.
Most of the field have had at least one outing since the start of April whilst Track of Time (on handicap debut today) and Oneforthegutter were last seen in January. Marhaba The Champ and top-weight Klondike, however, are returning from respective breaks of 230 days and 270 days, during which they were both gelded and Klondike had wind surgery.
Klondike is one of six yet to win over this trip, along with Track of Time, Westerton, Crystal Delight, Percy Shelley and Lightening Company, whilst of the eight runners to have raced at York before, only Marhaba The Champ, Kihavah and Two Brothers have won here. All three are former course and distance winners and Marhaba The Champ has also scored over 1m2½f here, whilst Kihavah's five efforts over track and trip have finished 16511 and it's two of this trio of CD winners that stand out on Instant Expert...
Track of Time makes a UK debut here and Westerton looks weak (1 from 6) at this grade and is rated some 14lbs higher than his last turf win. Crystal delight has fared better on good ground and standard A/W surfaces. Chillingham's three career wins have been at Classes 3, 4 and 5 and the same applies to Saratoga Gold, whilst Oneforthegutter would prefer it softer and he has struggled in this grade.
The bookies will pay four (some will pay five) places here, so the place stats might be more than useful...
...and if I apply my usual "at least two greens from the first four columns" rule, I'm left with these in draw order...
I've put them in draw order, because I now want to see if past similar races have benefited any particular part of the stalls, so let's check our draw analyser...
...which unsurprisingly (to me, anyway) suggests there's little in it and that's really how it should be. Over a mile and a half, the trip is easily long enough to unwind any potential draw bias and it's more likely to be race tactics and ability that determine the outcome, so with that thought in mind, let's run those 40-odd past races through our pace analyser, which tells us that...
...those who bide their time do best. We log the way horses run in the UK and allocate them 4pts if they led, 3pts for a prominent run, 2pts for those in mid-division and 1pt for a hold-up run, so we're really looking for horses who might run to a score of 2.50 or lower here and based on their last few efforts...
...you could still make a case for all of them. If I then refer back to how the pace has interacted with the draw, there's one combination that stands out...
...directing us to those drawn highest from our shortlisted runners.
Summary
In racecard order, my original thoughts were that I'd be looking at the likes of Klondike, Marhaba The Champ, Crystal Delight and Chillingham and all four remain on my shortlist. With both Klondike and Crystal Delight being drawn high, I'll keep those two for now. Marhaba The Champ and Kihavah were the eyecatchers from the win side of Instant Expert, so the former remains on my list and the latter now joins it, leaving me with Chillingham to consider and whilst I don't see him as a winner here, there's no reason based on his place form why he can't make the frame for the seventh time in nine flat races.
I'm aware that I've ended with five runners that I feel are capable of making the frame and I could easily have added a couple more, but some firms will pay five places, so let's look at the market, as of 4pm Tuesday...
...from here, I'd be inclined to side with Marhaba The Champ as my winner with small E/W plays for Kihavah and Chillingham, as I impose my 8/1 minimum odds rule. That said, Crystal Delight might well drift and become of interest again 😉
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