Cheltenham Festival 2018 - Microsystems

By the time you read this, the Cheltenham Festival 2018 will be just around the corner.

It is undoubtedly the highlight of the racing calendar for most owners, trainers and punters alike. It is the only time of the year when I bet on every single race. I do this to add a bit of spice to the enjoyment of racings flagship festival, but the bottom line is I try and make a profit every year.

There are a number of ways to approach the mammoth task of selecting a decent bet in each of the 28 races spread over the 4 days. One way is to create a number of microsystems based on horses and a trainer's past performance, and that is what I am aiming at this year. By concentrating on the most successful trainers it is possible to uncover the profiles of runners who fit the bill of a “Cheltenham horse”.

In this month’s article I will share with you a number of newly created microsystems that I will be using to go to war with the bookies this time around. I am focussing on those trainers with the best recent records at the festival and will be trying to discover the profiles of their runners that do so well at the Cheltenham Festival.

Gordon Elliott

Gordon Elliott’s first Festival winner came in 2011 and since then he has racked up no fewer than 14 winners from 98 runners for a level stakes profit of £114.09 at Betfair SP.

Pretty impressive stuff.

There is a nice split between non-handicap and handicap winners, as shown below, and it is the handicappers I will look at first.

The first thing to note is that the handicap chasers are 1-15 and the handicap hurdlers are 4-41, so it is the latter we will be taking a closer look at.

The first interesting statistic I uncovered is that all 4 of these winners had not won a handicap hurdle race previously but all 4 had won either 1 or 2 races that season. Concentrating on those runners I also uncovered the fact that all 4 had won between 2 and 5 career starts. All 4 winners had been off the track for 21 to 75 days and all finished in the top 5 on their last start.

Sticking all that into the mixer produces the following:

Gordon Elliott Handicap Hurdlers – Not won a handicap hurdle previously, 2-5 career starts, won 1-2 races in the current season, top 5 finish last time out, off the track for 21 to 75 days.

Next, we take a look at those 9 winners in non-handicap races.

He has had one bumper winner and 3 hurdles winners, but it is the 5 chase winners I will look at in detail.

First port of call is a break of at least 46 days. He clearly puts them away a good 6 to 7 weeks before the festival and all 5 non-handicap chase winners fit the bill on that score. All 5 winners had run at least 9 times over fences and all 5 winners were aged between 7yo and 9yo. I think it is safe to say we can leave it there as it produces the following results:

Those 5 winners include Don Cossack, Tiger Roll, Cause Of Causes (2 wins) and Chicago Grey. Don Cossack finished third in the Ryanair in 2015 and went on to win the Gold Cup in 2016. The only one of the 7 qualifiers to flop was Outlander. Cause Of Causes may go for the Cross Country Chase this year and will be 10yo. He would not qualify for this system on the age rule, but I would not hesitate to back him wherever he runs this year.

So, in summary:

Gordon Elliott Non-Handicap Chasers – Off the track for 46 days or longer, run at least 9 times over fences, aged 7yo to 9yo.

Now we move on to the main man himself, Willie Mullins.

Willie Mullins

Willie Mullins is the main man at the Festival and he has racked up 47 winners in total. No fewer than 44 have come since 2008 so that is the starting point for this analysis.

For whatever reason, his hurdlers tend to outperform the chasers and the bumper runners in terms of the number of wins and the strike rate as shown in the table below:

We will start with those hurdlers and then come back and look at the performance of the handicap and non-handicap runners.

So, the hurdlers have racked up an impressive 30 wins from 210 runners and make a small profit at Betfair SP. The bumper runners also make a profit, but they are just 3-40 so the chances of getting a Mullins winner in that race have been historically quite slim. The hurdlers have a near double the strike rate over the bumper runners and the Festival bumper is a race where I have an interest in an outsider to small stakes.

Back to the hurdlers and 23 have come in non-handicap races compared to just 7 in the handicap races. We will concentrate first on the non-handicappers and come back to the handicappers later since they have turned over a huge profit despite a relatively low strike rate of 10%.

The first thing to note is that all 23 of the non-handicap hurdles runners had won at least 2 times under Rules.

That takes the overall record to 23-116. All 23 winners were aged between 5yo and 10yo which eliminates a few more. 17 of the 23 winners last raced at one of the following three tracks; Fairyhouse, Punchestown and Leopardstown.

That brings the overall record to 17-60 (28.33% strike rate) and we begin to see a small profit at Betfair SP. All 26 winners had been off the track for 26 days or longer and 14 of the 16 won their last start before heading to the Festival. All 14 winners came over 2m ½f to 2m 5f and that leaves us with the following:

The mighty Quevega accounts for a fair number of those total wins but we can also add into the mix that 12 of those 14 winners were sent off favourite and all 14 were ridden by Ruby Walsh.

Ruby is not guaranteed to be fit for the Festival this time around so look to Paul Townend as he might be the one to benefit from the former’s absence.

Willie Mullins Non-Handicap Hurdlers – Aged 5yo to 10yo, racing over 2m ½f to 2m 5f, at least 2 career wins under Rules, off the track for 26 days or longer, finished 1st last time out, last raced at Fairyhouse, Punchestown or Leopardstown, stable first string.

Now we see if we can find a system for those handicap hurdlers where we saw a big profit at a low strike rate.

We can eliminate approximately half of the losers by just concentrating on 2 races; the County Hurdle run over 2m 1f and the Martin Pipe run over 2m 4 ½f. He has won those races 7 times from 36 runners for a profit of £69.50. All 7 winners were no shorter than 9/2 and no bigger than 25/1 at SP. There is not a lot else to go on with no real pattern in terms of finishing position last time out, career wins, handicap hurdle wins etc. so we will make this one simple:

Willie Mullins Handicap Hurdlers – All runners in the Martin Pipe or County Hurdle sent off at odds of 9/2 to 25/1.

Before we move on from Willie Mullins, I can tell you that he is 0-23 in the Festival handicap chases since 2008 so you may just save yourself a few quid by swerving those runners this year.

Jonjo O’Neill

Jonjo has a decent Festival record and he has racked up 22 winners since 2003. In fact, he has had at least 1 winner in 12 of the last 15 Festivals. He drew a blank last year, so we could say he is due a winner or two this time around.

He does not have the best strike rate (22-247; 8.91%) but his runners are worth exploring none the less.

We start by focussing on the 15 winners in non-handicap races that have won at a strike rate three times higher than the handicappers. They have an overall record of 15-97 (15.46% strike rate) and realise a profit of £82.38 at industry SP. All 15 winners were racing over 2m 1f or further and the ones racing over 2m and 2m ½f are 0-22 so we will give them the swerve.

All 15 winners were 10yo or younger. He has run a few over the age of 10yo but these have not gone on to win. 13 of the 15 winners went off at odds between 4/1 and 33/1.

He has had a couple of winners around the Even money but I want to ditch these and concentrate on those at a decent price. All 13 winners had run at least 4 times over fences and all 13 had been off the track for at least 16 days.

Now we are looking at the following results:

This system only throws up 1 or 2 qualifiers each time at the Festival but at a near 40% strike rate it is going into my tracker.

Jonjo O’Neill Non-Handicap Chasers – Finished 1st or 2nd last time out, aged 9yo or younger, at least 4 chase starts, racing over 2m 1f or further, off the track for 16 days or longer, priced 4/1 to 33/1

For our On Course Profits Gold members this month Nick takes a closer look at Paul Nicholls, the “plot man” AJ Martin and David Pipe.

You can upgrade to On Course Profits Gold here…
https://www.oncourseprofits.com/upgrade-to-gold/