Yorkshire's Garden Racecourse, Ripon Racecourse

In last month’s OCP magazine I looked at Beverley racecourse. Once again, I’m heading across ‘God’s Own County’ of Yorkshire to visit Ripon.
Ripon Racecourse, Yorkshire’s Garden Racecourse. If you visit you will know what I mean.

As before in this series of articles on British racecourses, I will look briefly at the track’s location, history, configuration and will also highlight some significant track stats.

History and Location

Ripon racecourse is in the historic city of Ripon, in North Yorkshire, whose medieval cathedral makes it one of the oldest cities in England. Racing has taken place in Ripon for over 300 years. However, it was 1900 when the racecourse moved to its present location on Boroughbridge Road. The first race meeting held at the present course took place in August 1900.

The racecourse is close to the A1 and is about 11 miles north of Harrogate. For those coming by public transport there is regular bus service from Leeds to Ripon.

Just across the road from Ripon Bus Station a shuttle bus collects racegoer’s before dropping all them off at the racecourse and returning them back to the centre.

The Great St Wilfrid Handicap which is a historic 6f handicap held each August is the most valuable race held at the racecourse each season.

The other big race of Ripon’s season is the Ripon Champion Two-Year Old Trophy, run over 6f and takes place on August Bank Holiday Monday fixture.

Track Configuration

A right-handed, oval circuit of around 1m 5f with a 5f straight to the winning post, and there is a separate 6f chute.

Owing to the rather cramped bends and the surface undulations in the straight, the track is rather sharp in character. The bends are sharp and there is a dip just over a furlong from home.

It’s a good track for prominent runners but although it can give the impression of being a flat track there are enough undulations to make it the sort of course that horses either handle or don’t.

The stands rail tends to be the place to be in the 5f & 6f races. A fast horse that can bag the rail can be tough to pass.

Ripon Stats

Let’s begin by looking at some general stats including favourite stats at the course since 2014.

The stats below are from Jan 1st 2015 to the time of writing (10/06/19) and cover all meetings at the course. Once again, I am using the ever useful www.horseracebase.com for the stats.

Let’s begin by looking at some general meeting stats from the last five years. Beginning with the fate of the favourites both clear and joint.

The results below contain 492 winners from 4290 runners.

Favourites

Clear, joint & co-favourites have produced the following set of results:

173 from 520 runners 33% – 29.61 A/E 0.95 309 placed 59%

Breaking those results down into handicap & non-handicap races gives us:

Non-handicap – 69 winners from 173 runners 40% -18.88 A/E 0.90 121 placed 70%.

Handicap – 105 winners from 359 runners 29% -17/5 A/E 0.97 193 placed 54%.

Digging a bit deeper let’s focus on favourites that won their last race and those favourites who had finished outside the first three on their last start.

• Favourites that won their last race have produced – 44 winners from 140 runners 31% -17.01 A/E 0.88 77 placed 55%.

• Favourites that had finished outside the top four on their last start produced – 53 winners from 160 runners 33% +1.01 A/E 1.05 89 placed 56%.

Trainers and Favourites:

If you’re a favourite backer. Then the best performing trainers when the money is down are:

Summary: Richard Fahey & Mark Johnston head the list of trainers numerically but Mark Johnston has an outstanding strike-rate at over 56% and his favourites are performing 40% above market expectations.

Other notable trainers with favourites are James Tate, Mick Channon and Jedd O’Keeffe.

Jockeys and Favourites:

Which jockeys have done the business when the money is down for favourite backers?

Summary: The top jockey numerically is Silvestre De Sousa who also has an excellent win strike rate and his favourites have been profitable to back blind.

It could also pay to keep Franny Norton & Joe Fanning onside going forward.

General Stats

Now a few general course stats. Starting with market position.

Market Position:

The top three in the betting provided 327 winners from 1527 runners 21% -229.38 A/E 0.87 750 placed 49%.
Odds SP: 28/1 & above – 9 winners from 665 runners 1% -213 A/E 0.65 39 placed 6%

Summary: Big priced winners do occasionally pop up at Ripon, but they are few and far between and if you have backed all runners at the meeting that started 28/1 or bigger you would have lost £232 to a £1 level stake.

Last Time Out Placing:

Those horses that finished in the first three in their last race provided 307 winners from 1480 runners 21% -48.46 A/E 1 670 placed 45%.

Last Time Out Winners:

Last time out winners provided 73 winners from 396 runners 18% -37.18 A/E 0.81 165 placed 42%.

Previous Course Winners:

Previous course winners provided 73 winners from 663 runners 12% -99.24 A/E 0.88 197 placed 31%.

Summary: The average for last time out winners in all turf flat races in the period is 16% with an A/E 0.87 so last time out winners are performing slightly below average at the course.

Previous course winners average, in a turf flat races in the period under analysis, is 12% with an A/E 0.85.

So, previous course winners are close to the average. If you had backed all previous course winners, you would have lost £99.24 to a £1 level stake.

Draw: I mentioned earlier that punters need to take note of any draw bias at a track.

Here are some results by draw segment by race distance.

For consistency I have just used handicap races only:

Summary: Looking at the effect of the draw. Over 6f those drawn in the first quarter are performing best.

Over a mile it’s those drawn on the outside who have provided the profit.

It’s over 1m 4f that the most significant draw stats are to be seen with those drawn out in the widest quarter winning close to 20% of races over the distance and are performing 32% above market expectations.

Trainer Stats and Angles.

Here are a few interesting trainer track stats, that will hopefully enable you to identify some winners at Ripon through the rest of this season.

1. Trainers & Handicap Runners In The Top-Three In The Betting.

James Given – 5 winners from 10 runners 50% +10.88 A/E 2.26 6 placed 60%.
Saeed Bin Suroor – 4 winners from 10 runners 40% +4.25 A/E 1.47 6 placed 60%.
Paul Midgley – 5 winners from 17 runners 29% +17 9 placed 53%.

2. Trainers & Two-year-old’s Making Their Racecourse Debut.

David O’Meara – 3 winners from 14 runners 21% +20.38 6 placed 43%.

3. Trainers & Handicap Debutants.

James Tate – 3 winners from 3 runners 100% +5.38 A/E 2.73.
Saeed Bin Suroor – 3 winners from 4 runners 75% +7 A/E 2.94.
Tim Easterby – 4 winners from 20 runners 20% +62.2 A/E 2.78 7 placed 35%.

4. Trainers & Race Class (Handicaps).

Ruth Carr – Class 3 – 6 winners from 22 runners 27% +77.25 A/E 2.64 11 placed 50%.
Ruth Carr – Class 4 – 6 winners from 28 runners 21% +26.25 A/E 1.92 11 placed 39%.
Richard Fahey – Class 5 – 10 winners from 38 runners 26% +32.92 A/E 1.52 15 placed 39%.

Summary: Ruth Carr runners in Class 3 & Class 4 handicaps need to be kept onside having provided the winners with 12 winners from 50 runners 24% +103.50 A/E 2.22 22 placed 44%.

Likewise, it’s worth noting any handicap debutants from the James Tate, Saeed Bin Suroor & Tim Easterby stables.

Twenty-five horses have made winning handicap debuts at Ripon.

Those three trainers have provided 40% of the winners from just 15% of the total runners having their first starts in a handicap.

Ripon Trainer Micro Angles:

System 40: Back Ruth Carr Handicap runners in Class 3 & Class 4 races only.

System 50: Back Handicap Debutants from the James Tate, Saeed Bin Suroor and Tim Easterby Stables.

Hopefully you enjoyed this brief look at Ripon racecourse and some of the track’s key stats.

The next instalment in this tour of British racecourses moves south to Lincolnshire to the jumps track at Market Rasen.

Until next time.

John