Racing Insights

Racing Insights, Wednesday 29/03/23

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!

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In addition to the free daily feature, we always open up a number of racecards to non-Gold subscribers and for Wednesday, they are...

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  • 3.20 Lingfield
  • 4.35 Navan
  • 4.45 Newcastle
  • 8.00 Kempton

My own personal settings for the TS report...

...have highlighted the following...

...and with James Fanshawe's sole entry above running in one of our 'free' races, I think I should attempt to assess the chances of Novel Legend in the 8.00 Kempton, a 7-runner, Class 4, 4yo+ A/W handicap over a right-handed two miles on standard to slow polytrack...

None of these won last time out, but Blazeon Five, First Emperor, Sarsons Risk and Novel Legend were all runners-up with the first three of that quartet winning two of their last five. Hydroplane & Vazir both won three starts ago, but Grandmaster Flash has eleven defeats on the bounce and hasn't made the frame in his last six.

None of this field raced at a lower grade last time out with Blazeon Five, Grandmaster Flash and fast-finisher Novel Legend all running at this Class 4 level. First Emperor was second at Class 3 with Vazir unplaced at that grade, Hydroplane was third at Class2, whilst Sarsons Risk was a faller in a Grade 2 hurdle, having won a Class 4 contest previously.

Hydroplane and Grandmaster Flash have both won over today's trip in the past with Blazeon Five and First Emperor having scored over this track & trip. As for results on standard to slow going and/or at Class 4, Instant Expert helps us to fill the gaps...

...where aside from indifferent results at this grade, Blazeon Five and First Emperor are the ones to catch the eye. The place stats are useful here, as they suggest that Blazeon Five might not actually be a blow out at Class 4, having finished 1222 in his last four efforts at this level...

At this point, I'd be making a mental note that the out of form pair, grandmaster Folash & Vazir should be discounted from my thoughts and I'd have doubts about First Emperor being good enough to run at this grade.

In a smallish field over two miles, the draw really shouldn't be able to make or break a runner's chance, so this aspect of the toolkit is probably not as important as usual, but for clarity/transparency, we should take a look anyway...

I wouldn't read too much into the suggestion there's a low draw bias here, as the figures are very much skewed by a disproportionate number of winners from stall 1 and my thoughts are that the actual tempo of the race would dictate who goes best. For the record, those races above have been won by horses running as follows...



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With mid-divisional to prominent runners faring best of all. We can look back at this field's last few runs to see how they might approach this one...

..but with many of them wanting to run in that mid-division zone, it doesn't actually help us solve the riddle.

Summary

When the draw and pace stats can't help us, then I generally fall back upon recent form and Instant Expert's suitability overview and if that's what I do here, the obvious choice to me is Blazeon Five, with three wins and three runner-up finishes from his last six. Four of those have been over course and distance where his form reads 1122 and whilst not wanting to disparage his previous riders, the booking of William Buick looks a positive move.

At 5.30pm Blazeon Five was 11/4 joint fav with featured horse, Novel Legend and I prefer the former to the latter. The latter has every chance of making the frame here if showing no rustiness from a five month break and they'll probably be the first two home. No E/W suggestion here.

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