November Rein: Yards to look out for as NH Season kicks off
November 6th, 2019November, usually a dreary miserable time of year in UK and Ireland, unless of course you are a fan of National Hunt racing!
It is the start of the season in earnest and in this article we are going to look at some trends focused on November.
First let us start with the trainer table. We see a number of promising WAX and Chi Scores which invite further investigating.
[Filters: November, NH races only, Filter Tab: Runners >=50, Chi Score >=2.0, present by trainer]
As many horses after a break are often not as favoured in the market as they might be with a recent run we will look at the breakdown of those who have not seen a race course since the end of the previous season and those who have been out since the start of the autumn.
[Filters: November, NH races only, DSLR >150 days, Filter Tab: Runners >=50, Chi Score >=2.0, present by trainer]
[Filters: November, NH races only, Number of Runs Last 2 months >0, Filter Tab: Runners >=50, Chi Score >=2.0, present by trainer]
Charlie Longsdon, a trainer who often does so well with his string in the early Autumn comes in well below expected as we enter the winter. Expected 29 winners but only 17 delivered. Note he has had 2 winners this month, but the record shows that of his strike rate in the first week of november is 14%, that figure then halves to 6% from November 8th onwards.
We see that hurdle runners are expected to do far better than they achieve in reality.
[Filters: November, NH races only, Trainer Charlie Longsdon, Present by Race Type]
[Filters: November, NH races only, Trainer Charlie Longsdon, Present by DSLR]
Colin Tizzard has moved his way to be one of the leading national hunt yards now both in terms of volume of runners and prize money standings. He appears at the top of the WAX charts. We can see from the tables above that he apparently does well with those coming in fresh as well as those with a recent run. But when we look at the Runs in the last 3 months filter it sheds some light that those who have had a number of runs do not set the world alight.
[Filters: NH races only, November only, Trainer Colin Tizzard, Present by Number of Runs in Last 3 Months]
His bumper runners are less frequent that his runners over obstacles
[Filters: NH races only, November only, Trainer Colin Tizzard, Present by Race Type]
The usefulness of Proform demonstrated once again to me personally where we see that non-handicap contests show far more significant results than handicap events 25% strike rate vs 16% and a far higher Chi Scr.
So if following Tizzard this November look for those in Non-Hcap events over obstacles, having less than 3 runs in the last 3 months. The yard has had a less than encouraging start to November so far but much the inverse of Charlie Longsdon, things traditionally seem to get better as the month rolls on.
Finally to Tom George who features prominently on the list of those doing well with seasonal debutant runners in November
[Filters: NH races only, November Only, Trainer Tom George, present by DSLR Ranges]
(0-7 days includes those having first run under rules)
Lets focus on those not seen in the last 90 days. The winners come from Handicap and Non Handicap events and shows good figures from a system perspective across the codes.
[Filters: NH races only, November Only, DSLR >90, Trainer Tom George, present by Race Type]
And while there is no good reason to narrow by race class, the lion’s share of the winners (23/28) came from Class 3 and 4 contests.
There is just a flavour of an avenue you would be well served to dig deeper into on your own Proform Database. It is tough for odds compliers to know what to expect after a break, trainer comments and stable tours can help but nothing like seeing what the habits of trainer look like in the facts and figures.
