Saturday leaders and laggers
By colin on Saturday, August 21st, 2010Today’s Saturday’s front runners are now up in the Betwise Members’ area. Some interesting contenders today on the leaders front, with win chances as well as likely pace setters.
Victorian Bounty is the first up in the Chester 2.20 – interesting because not only is it top of the leader rankings, meaning it is likely to set the pace, but is some way clear of its rivals on that front. And, as we’ve written many times before, he has the advantage of being drawn low, in stall 3. Stalls 1 and 2 show far and away the biggest bias, but stall 3 with a better break than that of the inner runners can be just as advantageous. Interesting that the Smartform tissue had this runner at 10/1, which is the same tissue price used on a number of online form guides, but the actual price being offered by many bookies is already a lot shorter, around 7/1.
Plenty of other good opportunities in sprints today – the leader and lagger ratings are a great starting point to narrow the field before further analysis on draw and form.
Ebor trends
By colin on Wednesday, August 18th, 2010A rare midweek post for us, motivated by the Ebor handicap (3.25, York) today. At the risk of stating the obvious, good racing analysis is often simply about knowing when to use the right tool for the right job – eg. the same methods you would use to analyse a 5 furlong sprint at Epsom will not do you much good in finding the winner of the Grand National.
Big handicap races are often in a category of their own, and therefore trend analysis, analysing the profile of previous winners of the same race, can be a useful method which helps narrow the field in looking for the winner of such races.
Here are the significant past trends that I think are worth concentrating on in the Ebor Handicap:
1. Previous winners are generally lower in the handicap, carrying lower weights.
2. Older horses (generally 4 and 5 yr olds) have been favoured, rather than 3 year olds, in the last 10 years (though no 3 yr old is running today!).
3. Lower draws (somewhat bizzarely for a longer distance race) have always been favoured.
You can look at the racecard and make your own analysis by applying these trends. For me, 2 horses stand out that qualify by doing so:
Elyaddi, drawn 3 and ridden by last year’s winning jockey and Bernie The Bolt, drawn 2 and ridden by Jimmy Fortune. Desert Sea is drawn 1 and is also low in the handicap, but I don’t like the odds of a 7 year old winning. Looking at the form, I like the chance of Bernie The Bolt to keep improving and with a win and place bet at a price of 16/1.
Around the country, it’s tipping down, what to do?
By colin on Saturday, August 14th, 2010It’s tipping down (how apt, for racing), it’s raining cats and dogs.
Your carefully thought out racing selections from yesterday evening have all been declared non-runners or you are unsure if they perform on the ever-worsening ground conditions. What to do?
If ground really is that important to your selection process, use Smartform to program current and historic going as a variable with different numeric levels, however you feel it’s appropriate, for example:
1 = Hard
2 = Firm
3 = Good to Firm
and so on….
If you think that’s a little inflexible, widen your categories to be more forgiving of previously inaccurate going descriptions, so category 1 = Hard, Firm, and Good to Firm. Category 2 can cover Good, Good to Soft and so on – right down to Heavy.
Keep your selections (or add the new going condition to your selection model), and run them against their previous historic performances on the prevailing going in Smartform. For sure, you’re going to have to write a small program to do this (or get us to do it for you), but it’s not so hard. There are a large number of methods you can use to evaluate performance on different types of going, but let’s say that any selection must have recorded a previous Smartform handicap rating on today’s prevailing going within N% of its best ever rating, in order to remain a selection. As ground conditions continues to worsen, you may find today that you are running everything for a condition of Heavy going – but it is August in Britain, what do you expect? 😉
Saturday Sprint Leaders August 7th
By colin on Saturday, August 7th, 2010After a brief holiday last week, today’s lagger and leader statistics, as highlighted in the blog on previous Saturdays, are now online in the Betwise Members’ area.
There are a large number of races rated today – over 17. As with any ratings they should be used with care when betting. The Leader ratings have a high success rate at predicting the leaders in the first half of the race, but an early leader has varying success at winning the race depending on the horse’s relative ability, its draw, and, last but not least, the course it is racing on. In general, it’s harder to win from the front in bigger fields at straight, galloping courses. So today’s meetings at Haydock and Ayr should be treated with caution if looking for winners amongst early leaders. Back to “lay-in-running” opportunities for small stakes (small stakes because the exchange markets are not that liquid for higher priced horses in running) may be found in many of the highest rated leaders, irrespective of course conditions, providing the bettor is quick on the draw in getting out.
King George value?
By colin on Saturday, July 24th, 2010A quick word on the King George.
The credentials of Workforce are there for all to see. Who wouldn’t want to see him to go on and confirm himself as this year’s wonderhorse after his extermely impressive Derby win? But it seems to be forgotten that Cape Blanco beat Workforce in the Dante by over 3 lengths (though Workforce had something of an excuse), and won the Irish Derby last time out. With Workforce likely to start at evens or odds on, and Cape Blanco at 6/1, is there some value in Cape Blanco’s price? What about the older horses? The last 10 years have only seen two 3yr old winners. With some of these older horses still improving, can we be sure this year’s 3yr olds are even good enough?
Well, today we’ll see. Too much to savour to worry about betting.
Saturday sprint leaders
By colin on Saturday, July 24th, 2010Today’s lagger and leader statistics, as highlighted in the blog on previous Saturdays, are now online in the Betwise Members’ area. Last week’s top leaders for each race threw up Peppercorn Rent amongst others, purely on the basis of its running characteristics, winning at 16/1 at Ripon.
Newbury Super Sprint
By colin on Saturday, July 17th, 2010Newbury, 3.20. Over 20 runners line up for a 5 furlong dash over Newbury’s wide, galloping 5 furlong course for ground on the soft side of good. In case you were expecting one of Betwise’s super draw graphs to accompany the occasion, we’re sorry to disappoint. There just aren’t enough occasions when anything like this many runners line up for a 5 furlong dash at Newbury, let alone on this ground, to make a graph meaningful. In fact, it would likely mislead. If there is any identifiable bias, it is towards the far rail (so with low numbers), but there’s not enough data to state this with certainty. However, we’re somewhat encouraged by Blessed Place’s victory yesterday when it raced alone on the far rail, also.
Front runner statistics are also unlikely to help us much in this race. With so many (fast) runners, it’s sure to be a true test of pace and unlikely that any runner can “steal” the race by getting an early lead. In fact, early pacesetters are liable to set up the race for something with a turn of foot towards the end – especially given that today’s test on the ground may be quite stiff.
What to do in the case of a sprint without any obvious pace or draw angle? Why, look for the fastest horse over the distance, of course. What better statistics to use in this case than the best speed rating for each horse (which we can find in the previous form of each runner in the Smartform database).
There are a few contenders but with previous form on the ground, Ballista and Temple Meads stand out. If indeed there is an advantage to being drawn on the far rail, then Temple Meads, in stall 1, is also well placed to take it. But at 6/1 in a 25 runner field, Temple Meads will already be vying for favouritism with Richard Hannon’s leading hope, Reckless Reward. Both are short enough in price, we think, so Ballista will be better value, especially on the exchanges. However, the draw in 13 is something of an unknown and we have to forgive its last, somewhat below par, run. Of the outsiders, the Smartform speed figures show that Golden Shine is making nice improvement, recording a significantly better rating last time out, and will be an even bigger price on the exchanges.
South Africa v India latest score
By BBC Sport | Sport Homepage | World Edition on Tuesday, July 13th, 2010South Africa take on India in Durban in their Twenty20 match.
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Why stall 1 wins at Chester – even when it’s stall 9
By colin on Sunday, July 11th, 2010Yesterday’s City Wall Stakes was a fascinating race to watch from many perspectives, and well worth a second look for as long as the video link here holds good. We wrote beforehand about the draw statistics at Chester, which were completely against the eventual winner, Blue Jack, drawn in stall 9. Our favoured runners were drawn 1 and 2, with Glamorous Spirit, in stall 2, the best previous front runner in the race and therefore predicted to lead early.
The prediction was right – Glamorous Spirit set off at a furious pace and quickly led towards the inside rail. However, the pace was indeed furious. Glamorous Spirit must be one of the fastest breaking horses in training. She was also our front-running prediction in the Epsom Dash a few weeks back, when drawn on the unfavoured inside rail there – indeed she did break best, but her poor draw meant her race was quickly over.
In the context of yesterday’s race at Chester, she effectively burned herself out early on, and faded to be last – though even with this explanation, her run was still some way below her best form. (She may be seen to better effect on a straighter track where her early speed will not be blunted, as when winning a valuable race at the Curragh prior to yesterday’s outing – though the trainer seems to think otherwise.)
However, from the perspective of the Chester draw, Blue Jack, the winner, provides us with the most interesting run from this race. There’s no better use for the cliche “the exception that proves the rule” than his run. Blue Jack broke slowly, as indeed our lagger statistics over at the Betwise Members’ area (available until next Saturday) also correctly predicted. Blue Jack was given over a 50% chance of starting the slowest in the race before it began. As the commentator noted, Blue Jack was indeed slowest out of the stalls and “lost a few lengths at the start” – at least in relation to the rest of the field being carted along by Glamorous Spirit. However, Blue Jack’s jockey, Richard Kingscote, used that negative to good advantage and rode a very shrewd race, dropping her in behind the field early and hugging the inside rail position around the Roodee’s tight bends. It’s this position that produces the strong bias to stall 1, with any runner that sticks to the inside rail covering far less ground than those racing wide. The fact that R Kingscote managed to obtain it from stall 9 was a nice bonus. With the pace at which the leaders set off, he was able to let Blue Jack gain momentum in his own time – but the crucial point is that this was done on the inside rail. So “stall 1” wins at Chester, even when it’s stall 9…