A fledgling race in respect to historical trends and numerically small sample sizes all skewed by Kauto Star’s multiple wins, we threw the JCB power of Proform Professional at the race to unearth the following fact, stats and trends.

 

The Ditcheat Job

You don’t need a computer to recognise that trainer Paul Nicholls has a strangle hold on this race with 5 winners from 10 runners, a 155% better than expected performance.

HOWEVER, 4 of those wins were by the great Kauto Star, 1 by Silviniaco Conti.

Qualifier: Silviniaco Conti

 

A Favourites Chance?

Horses that were favourite’s last time out have won 7 times from 20 runners, a modest 14% better than expected performance.

Favourites in the race performed slightly under par with a 10% worse than expected performance.

How do we know this?

For the statistics geeks; in theory, given the winning starting prices of the 4 favourites 10/11, 11/10, 4/5, 4/6 (3 races were won by Kauto Star) their combined probabilities should have resulted in 4.45 winners.

For everyone else who is not statistically inclined (or wondering how you can get .45 of a winner), our advice if you fancy the jolly is not to pile in with your house keeping money.

Based on trends, the eventual favourite in the race may romp home. However, it won’t pay much if it does win. And as always there is a chance it may lose as well.

Qualifiers (favourite LTO): Cue Card, Dynaste, Silviniaco Conti

 

Miles on the Clock

Side with runners who can go the race distance.

Of the 9 renewals, 6 winners ran over 3 miles in their previous race returning a profit at Betfair Starting Prices of £15.65 to a £1 stake, 32.04% return on investment.

Qualifiers: Double Ross, Dynaste, Medermit, Menorah, Silviniaco Conti, Taquin Du Seuil, The Giant Bolster

 

Tailgaters

History indicates that horses which ran prominently in their last race won 7 times from a population of 29 runners. This is a 31% better than expected performance.

Delving a little deeper, 4 of those of those wins are attributable to the front running Kauto Star.

Betfair Chase winners Snoopy Loopy (2008) and Imperial Commander (2010) also liked to run prominently.

If we rely on historical data for the Betfair Chase from 2005 to 2012, we are unfortunately trying to derive trends from crumbs of data.

Therefore, to obtain a more realistic numerical sample, we expanded our database query to include data from other non-handicap races over 3 miles at Haydock to take account of runners who also ran prominently in their prior race.

With a 14% better than expected performance from a larger population of 107 runners (18 winners), we can now take into consideration any runners in the Betfair Chase that ran prominently last time out.

Qualifiers: The Giant Bolster, Menorah, Cue Card, Double Ross, Harry Topper, Taquin Du Seuil

 

Betting Market

The front three in the market have accounted for 7 wins from 9 renewals although last year’s winner Cur Card was priced at 9/1 so from a value perspective horses priced at the higher end of the market should not dismissed easily.

Qualifiers: Cue Card, Silviniaco Conti, Dynaste

 

Selections

In an enthralling race our selections are

1. Silviniaco Conti
2. Cue Card
3. Dynaste