In this, and subsequent articles I am picking up the baton from Matt and Jon who have both previously written excellent pieces digging into the profiles of certain trainers, writes Dave Renham. As we are heading into the winter months it makes sense to throw the spotlight on some National Hunt trainers for this latest series. The first trainer I am going to look at is one of Britain's winter luminaries, Paul Nicholls.

I will be analysing nearly ten years of UK racing data from 1^st January 2013 to 31^st October 2022, the majority of which can be sourced by members using the Geegeez Query Tool. All profits / losses have been calculated to Industry Starting Price. Of course, we should be able to significantly improve upon the baseline figures of SP using the exchanges or BOG (Best Odds Guaranteed), and I will share Betfair SP data when appropriate.

Paul Nicholls Brief Biography

Born in Gloucestershire on April 17^th 1962, Paul Frank Nicholls was educated at Marlwood School. He didn’t carry on into further education because, upon leaving school aged 16, he started working in a point-to-point yard. By the age of 20 he was race riding for Josh Gifford out of Findon, West Sussex, and then, in 1985, he moved to David Barons. His biggest successes as a jockey were back to back wins in the Hennessy Gold Cup (1986 & ’87) and, in his seven year career, he rode a relatively modest 133 winners. However, it is as a trainer that he has really excelled. Nicholls first took out his licence in 1991 but his training career took off in 1999 when he bagged three wins at the Cheltenham Festival, including the Gold Cup with See More Business. He was crowned Champion trainer for the first time in 2005-06 and, since then, has repeated this feat an amazing dozen further times.

Paul Nicholls Overall Performance Record

Below is Paul Nicholls' win record by calendar year:

 

Every year during the decade or so in review, his win strike rate has exceeded 20% which is impressive. Also, both his win and each way figures are consistent; both can be seen on the graph below:

 

 

Nicholls' overall win strike rate across the 10-year period stands at 23%; the each way SR at 43.2%. Breaking down into five-year groups really demonstrates his consistency:

 

Not surprisingly, though, given the Ditcheat handler's high profile, profits are hard to come by; and if you had backed all 5693 runners you would have lost roughly 12p in the £ to Industry SP. However, this improves to just under a 3p loss in the £ using BSP - not the worst way to lose a few quid with a high strike rate!

At this juncture it is worth mentioning Nicholls does send the occasional runner over to Ireland, but these are extremely rare. Indeed, just 29 runners have crossed the Irish Sea since 2013 with five winning and a further eight getting placed. Backing all his Irish runners would have seen a steep loss of 40p in the £.

It's time to dig a bit deeper.

Paul Nicholls Performance by Race Distance

When Matt dug into the Nicky Henderson numbers we saw a definite preference for shorter distances. What about his great rival Nicholls?

 

The distance distinction is not as pronounced as with the Henderson data but Team Nicholls do also seem to perform slightly worse in staying races, both from a win and returns perspective. The each way figures correlate, too, with 3 mile+ runners placing just over 36% of the time compared to the other two distance groups which stand at 46.3% (2m1f or less) and 44.8% (2m2f to 2m6f).

Paul Nicholls Performance in 3 mile+ Races

I want to dig into these 3 mile+ races in more detail as I think it is equally important to share negative angles as positive ones; avoiding poor value bets will clearly help our bottom line in the long run.

When we split these longer races into handicap and non-handicap races we get some very interesting results:

 

One might expect some difference in the win strike rates in favour of non-handicaps, due to quality biases and field size, but it is the returns that stand out. In non-handicap staying races, blanket support would have nudged into BSP profit; whereas in handicap races, losses of 31.58% (SP) are steep and, even using BSP, this only improved to a loss of 23.5% (23.5p in the £).

Here are the splits for 3m+ handicap chases and handicap hurdles:

 

Here we see similar win percentages, Impact Values and Actual vs Expected (A/E) indices; handicap chases have lost a little less money, but I would suggest these races are generally worth avoiding, unless you have a good additional reason to get involved.

 

Paul Nicholls Performance in Handicaps at 2m6f or less

Having seen some relatively poor stats for staying handicaps, let me share some more positive data.

 

As can be seen, Nicholls has recorded much higher strike rates, A/E and IV indices and, in the case of handicap hurdles, the smallest of profits even at starting price. At BSP, however, those profits would be just above the £200 mark to £1 level stakes – this equates to excellent returns of 22p in the £.

Despite this positive performance in handicap hurdle races of 2m6f or less, it is interesting to see the varying win strike rates at different courses. Below are all courses where Nicholls has had at least 40 runners:

 

 

There is quite a range here: one might expect lower strike rates at Ascot and Cheltenham due to the competitive nature of the races and, generally, races at these courses have bigger fields. Despite the low win rate, however, Nicholls has made an SP profit at Cheltenham in this context.

I want to share Nicholls' Taunton data specifically, as it is impressive: 18 wins from 71 runners, with a further 22 placed. Taunton SP profits stand at £27.47 (ROI +38.7%). BSP profits would have been increased considerably to +£47.29 (ROI +49.3%).

Paul Nicholls Performance in Non-handicap races

We have already seen that Nicholls has performed well in non-handicap races of 3 miles or further. Here are his overall non-handicap stats across different race types (all distances):

 

There are not many hunter chase runners per year (average around 13), but that cohort has made a small profit. However, the profit is hugely skewed due to two big-priced Cheltenham winners at 16/1 and 25/1.

His non-handicap chase figures (excluding hunter chases) also look very solid. Below I have broken down this record by age of horse – and it reveals a clear pattern:

 

 

There is a definite drop off in success rate in non-handicap chases as the horses hit the age of 8. Horses aged 7 or younger actually made a 3% profit to BSP; those 8 or older would have lost nearly 19% to BSP.

Sticking with these non-handicap chases (excluding hunter chases) and splitting the performance by starting price gives us the following breakdown:

 

Clearly horses priced between evens and 9/2 have offered punters good value in the past. The figures in the table above are to Industry SP; using Betfair SP one would have roughly doubled those profits. We can see very good A/E indices, too. In contrast, once starting prices get to 5/1 or bigger, there have been quite significant losses.

Paul Nicholls Performance by Starting Price

We have seen some SP data already, but let us now look at all races as a whole:

 

The win strike rates go down uniformly as the price bands increase – nothing unusual there. Industry SP losses have been smallest with the shorter priced runners, but the Betfair SP returns on investment are probably more useful to see.

 

 

Using Betfair SP sees a much more even return on investment across the price bands (ranging from a high of +1.6% to a low of -7.6%). In contrast to the Industry SP figures, it actually looks more advantageous to focus on runners priced 5/1 or bigger.

Paul Nicholls Performance by Course

I shared a small amount of course data earlier, but I want to dig a little deeper. I am going to look at all courses where Nicholls has had at least 100 runners and break the data down into different subsets. Firstly I am going to look at win strike rate and A/E indices across all races, hurdle races, and chases (again excluding hunter chases). With a ‘par’ A/E index for all trainers at around 0.87, I have highlighted A/E indices of 0.95 or higher (in green) – these are essentially positive. A/E indices of 0.79 or lower (in red) are negative:

 

 

There is a good sprinkling of positive A/E indices with not many negative ones; strong overall stats emerge for Fontwell, Newbury and Taunton.

Meanwhile, Haydock fascinates me; here, Nicholls' chase figures are exceptional, showing a 31p in the £ profit to SP, but his hurdle figures at the same course are dire, with a very low strike rate and losses in excess of a bruising 62p in the £. There are some things you just cannot explain!

Now a look at the same courses comparing handicap with non-handicap results using the same colour coding as before:

 

 

This time there is a more even split of positive and negative A/E indices. Fontwell and Newbury once again stand out, while Haydock again has hugely conflicting figures – excellent non-handicap results, dreadful handicap ones.

I have dug still deeper at different courses to share with you five positive looking PFN track stats:

1. At Fontwell in non-handicap chases (excluding hunter chases) the stable has secured 22 wins from 36 (SR 61.1%) for a profit of £9.73 (ROI +27.0%). Using BSP would increase profits marginally to £11.64 (ROI +32.3%);
2. At Haydock in non-handicap chases (excluding hunter chases) horses that started first or second favourite have bagged 10 wins from 16 (SR 62.5%) for a profit of £14.06 (ROI +87.9%). A slight increase again if using BSP with profits up slightly to £15.44 (ROI +96.5%);
3. In non-handicap novice hurdles at Wincanton, Nicholls has seen 67 of his 133 runners win securing a strike rate of 50.4%. Backing all runners would have yielded an SP profit of £30.09 (ROI +22.6%); BSP profits stand at £38.38 (ROI +28.9%);
4. At Taunton if you backed all his runners in hurdle races at 2m1f or less you would have been rewarded with 38 wins from 107 (SR 35.5%) for an SP profit of £19.51 (ROI +18.2%); BSP profits would have been double, at £38.78 (ROI +36.2%);
5. In handicap hurdle races at Musselburgh, Nicholls has sent only 22 runners on the long trek to such events but nine have won with a further five placing. Returns of over 90p in the £ were achieved to SP; to BSP this increases to 108p in the £. When Harry Cobden has ridden, he has managed five wins and two places from just eight runs.

Paul Nicholls Performance by Horse Run Style

As regular readers of mine will know, running style data is something I believe can often be an important piece of the betting puzzle. To begin with let us see the proportion of runners that fit a specific running style. Geegeez breaks running styles into four:

Led – front runners; horse or horses that take an early lead;

Prominent – horses that track the pace close behind the leader(s);

Mid Division – horses that race mid pack;

Held Up – horses that race at, or near the back of the field early.

 

Here are the splits for Nicholls:

 

We can see the marked preference for a prominent running style, tracking the early pace. That approach has accounted for over 40% of all runners from the stable. The other three run styles are each around the 20% mark.

From here, let us review the win success rate of each running style:

 

 

This is a very familiar pattern, with horses that go to the front and lead early (L) winning a far bigger proportion of races compared to other run styles. Front runners from the Nicholls stable are edging towards winning 40% of the time. Prominent racers also do well, hitting around one win in every four races; but horses that raced mid-pack or to the rear have relatively poor records.

I want to look at favourites now to see their success rate in terms of run style:

 

 

We see exactly the same pattern here with early leading favourites having an excellent record. By contrast, if you had backed every Nicholls favourite that ended up racing early in mid-division or at the back, you would have lost a whopping 33p in the £ to SP.

We have seen already that 19.61% of runners from the stable lead when we look at all races as a whole; but this figure differs markedly depending on the race type as the table below shows:

 

 

It seems therefore that non-handicap chases are the race types where we are most likely to see a Nicholls horse front run: out of trouble. However, it should be noted that the figures are skewed somewhat as non-handicaps (both hurdle and chase) tend to have slightly smaller average field sizes when compared to handicaps. To mitigate for that, I have chosen an arbitrary field size band so that we can more easily compare ‘led’ percentages across race types. I've selected races of 6 to 8 runners only to see what happens:

 

 

So in races of 6 to 8 runners we can see that non-handicaps are still much more likely to see a Nicholls runner at the front of the pack early compared to handicaps. The gap has narrowed but it is still significant. Perhaps the most interesting finding here is that front runners in National Hunt Flat races have increased considerably in these relatively small fields. There were 81 qualifying NH Flat races and Nicholls runners led early in 30 of them. Of these, a good proportion (43.3%) went onto to win.

This is a good time to mention that statistics can be really useful and informative but, naturally, it is important to see the bigger picture as possible. Sometimes stats in isolation can be a little misleading and we need context as much as possible.

Paul Nicholls Performance by Jockey

Onto some jockey analysis now. The table below shows all jockeys to have ridden at least 50 times for Nicholls since 2013, with the proviso that they have had at least one ride for the stable in 2022. I have ordered them by number of rides starting with the most:

 

 

Stable jockey Harry Cobden has a very good record on favourites scoring nearly 46% of the time for a break even scenario to SP (profit of 4p in the £ to BSP). However, the stand out here is Bryony Frost – a strike rate of around one win in every four and a profit to boot. If betting every runner of hers at BSP the profits would have risen to £113.87 (ROI +26.8%).

She has done especially well in non-handicap chases thanks to 28 wins from 65 runners (SR 43.1%) for an SP profit of £55.11 (ROI +84.8%). At BSP these returns increase by a few pence to 92p in the £.

Here are three more Frost / Nicholls stats to be aware of:

1. Their combined record at Ascot, Cheltenham and Kempton is impressive considering the competitive nature of the races at these tracks:

 

2. When Frost has taken an early lead, she has won on over of 40% those runners. On hold up horses, though, she has won less than 10% of the time (SR 9.3%);
3. Frost has an excellent record on horses she has ridden before. 68 winners from 245 rides (SR 27.8%) for a profit to SP of £87.53 (ROI +35.7%); profit to BSP of £127.01 (ROI +51.8%).

Frost is back in the saddle after a lengthy spell on the side lines so hopefully she will continue her success for Nicholls during the remainder of this season and beyond.

Paul Nicholls – Extra stats and nuggets

With the main body of the article complete let me just share with you some extra stats or nuggets that may be of interest:

1. Nicholls' longest losing run over the ten seasons stands at 29. He has had 29 losers in a row on five separate occasions
2. He has saddled back to back winners (e.g. one horse winning and then his next runner winning also) on 340 separate occasions
3. There are punters around who occasionally back their favourite trainer or favourite jockey and put their selections in doubles, trebles etc. Hence I thought I would look at what would have happened if you had backed all Paul Nicholls runners in trebles on the days when he had exactly three runners. He has had exactly three runners running on the same day 212 times; the treble would have been landed seven times. However, due to the fact that most prices were quite short, if you had placed a £1 win treble on all 212 days you would have lost £96.59 (ROI -45.6%). Even worse would have occurred on days where he had exactly four runners – if you had backed all four runners in a win fourfold accumulator on each of those days, you would have landed a winning bet just once, losing a whopping £136.09 (ROI -76.9%). I am not saying punters cannot be successful with these types of bets, but the odds are generally stacked against us
4. Just over 400 horses have run at least five times for Nicholls – of these horses 85% of them have won at least one race
5. In handicaps the time to catch Nicholls runners is when they have had five or fewer previous runs in a handicap. This cohort has combined to win 291 of their 1624 races. Backing them at BSP would have secured a healthy profit of £243.35 (ROI +15.0%)

Paul Nicholls – Main Takeaways

Below is a summary of the key findings from my research above. It's a handy 'cut out and keep cheat sheet' for those who like such things.

1. Every year Nicholls has secured an overall win strike rate of over 20%
2. Distance wise, Nicholls has a relatively poor record in handicap races of 3 miles or more
3. Handicap hurdle races at 2m 6f or less have seen impressive returns to BSP of 22p in the £
4. In non-handicap chases (excluding hunter chases), horses aged 7 or younger have produced a small 3p in the £ profit to BSP
5. Several course stats have been highlighted; three of the strongest being in handicap hurdles at Musselburgh, non-handicap chases at Fontwell, and non-handicap novice hurdles at Wincanton
6. Over 40% of PFN runners take a prominent position early, of which just over 25% go onto win. His best run style performance comes with front runners / early leaders: they have won 38.5% of their races
7. Bryony Frost has a good overall record and she has excelled in non-handicap chases
8. Look for horses in handicaps who have previously had five or fewer handicap runs

Paul Nicholls is an incredibly successful trainer and this article has unlocked a few angles that have proved to be positive in the past. Hopefully they will continue that way for at least some time in the future, too! Also there some negatives that we need to be aware of.

I hope you have enjoyed this piece and I’ll be back next week with a drill down into the stats of another National Hunt trainer, Mr Daniel Skelton.

- DR