The Cheltenham Years

This years’ Cheltenham Festival takes place from Tuesday March 15^th – closing on Friday March 19^th and with the main feature event, the Boodles Cheltenham Gold Cup Chase being run on Thursday 18^th March.

The rivalry each year between the English and the Irish is one of jovial banter and smiles, usually enhanced by the odd pint of Guinness or two, with years past having the Irish cheer the loudest with their success as the Gordon Elliott and Willie Mullins trained runners pass the finish line.

28 races will make up the festival over the 4 days this year with some 500 horses battling it out for a share of over £6 million in prize money.

Over the years we have tried to find the holy grail of methods to fine the winners at Cheltenham, some have failed but some have delivered a profit and so it seems prudent that we re-visit a couple of those methods.

Hopefully they may offer up a profitable Cheltenham Festival for 2022.

SIRES

The breeding of runners at Cheltenham is often flagged as a factor to take serious note of.

Robin Des Champs – Way back in 2015 we highlighted the success of horses sired by Robin Des Champs. 2010-2014 saw a win strike rate of 40%. That strike rate has dropped during 2015-to date to 16.67%, being decimated in 2019 and 2020 and with no progeny in 2021 running at the festival. And with just 1 runner currently entered for 2022, 5.30 Tuesday 15^th March, Castle Robin, we feel this angle has lost its edge.

Oscar (IRE) on the other hand has flagged up some nice, priced winners in recent years. 2016-2018 festival runners performed poorly but 2018 flagged up Kilbricken Storm 33/1 (46.92 BFSP) and 2020 Lisnagar Oscar 50/1 (120.00 BFSP). With currently 6 progenies entered for the meeting in 2022 we think it is still worth backing the Oscar Progeny at the Cheltenham Festival. We only need one at a reasonable price to land us a profit.

Back all Oscar (IRE) Progeny at the Cheltenham Festival in 2022 to Win. (Currently entered are Tommy’s Oscar, The Bosses Oscar, Pats Fancy, Oscar Elite, Lisnagar Oscar, Paisley Park.)

A more recent addition to the sires list may be Yeats. We may find it strange that a Flat Turf winner would sire a Cheltenham winner, but of course we must remember that many a flat runner goes on to be an outstanding hurdler and may even move on to the larger obstacles. Last year we saw a 36% win strike rate and a 63% place strike rate for the Yeats progeny at the meeting producing a profit of 50 points (61.63 at BFSP) had you backed to win only.

Those 4 winners were Heaven Help Us 33/1 (39.83 BFSP), Chantry House 9/1 (15.00 BFSP), Flooring Porter 12/1 (15.00) and Mount Ida 3/1F (4.20).

There are 18 progenies currently entered for this years’ festival and a number of 6 and 7 year olds who may offer a good run for our money (all 4 winners were aged 6-7years).

Back Yeats Progeny aged 6-7years at the Cheltenham Festival.

Presenting was flagged up in 2015 as a possible but this is one sire, we feel we need to stay away from. Since flagging Presenting progeny as a possible success at Cheltenham there have been just 3 winners from 107 runners. Along with Gold Well (1 winner from 45 runners), these may be ones for the layers perhaps?

TRAINERS

Gavin Patrick Cromwell – Very few runners come from this stable, but had you backed his handful of Hurdle runners blindly in the last 3 years festivals you would have won 33 points (49.80 BFSP). 2020 was a 0 from 6 runners’ year and what a year that was, best forgotten, but the previous year was 1 from 2 runners, and 2021, 2 from 4 runners.

This year there are several runners entered currently, given that winners when they arrive have tended to be double figure priced (Espoir Dallen 2019 16/1 (26.00) and Flooring Porter 11/1 (15.00) and Vanillier 14/1 (22.00)) we are willing to follow any runners from the small Cromwell stable that come up at Cheltenham this year.

Back Gavin Cromwell runners at the Cheltenham Festival.

Gordon Elliott – We picked up on Gordon Elliott in 2019. His first winner came back in 2011 and as the stable grew over the years so have the numbers of runners at the festival.

In more recent years (the last, 2018-2020 no runners in 2021) the years have alternated between boom and bust, 2018 +51.73 points (75.94 BFSP), 2019 -34.75 points (-33.37 BFSP) and 2020 +12.57 points (22.36 BFSP).

With no runners at the festival in 2021** it may be that Gordon Elliott intends to land on the English shores mob handed this year given the early entries for the festival. Backing blindly may not be of use given the numbers of runners involved.

Most of the profits during this recent period have come from Novices Chasers, Handicap Chasers and Handicap Hurdlers, from horses aged between 4 and 8 years old, but beware of 6 year olds. In recent years the 6 years olds are 0 from 16 running in the above race types.

** In 2021 Gordon Elliott was serving a ban and his stable was trained by Denise Foster whose Cheltenham runners produced a loss of -10.5 (BSP – 8.64).

The figures above include those 16, 6 year old runners, so we are hopeful that if Elliott can get back to a 20% strike rate in the above races for 2022 there is a strong chance of a profit.

System 92: Back Gordon Elliott’s Novice and Handicap Chasers and Handicap Hurdlers aged between 4-5 and 7-8 years.

Henry De Bromhead – Henry De Bromhead’s first winner was back in 2011 also but subsequent years were barren of winners at the festival until we get to 2017.

But that profit of 38.35 points may sound inviting but as we can see most of that came because of healthy profits from 2 winners in 2019.

But if we look closer at the race type, we can clearly see that we need to avoid the Handicap Chases and Hurdles. Not one winner from 19 runners in recent years.

And in fact, he has only had 1 winner in 32 runs since 2011 in Handicap Chases and Hurdles.

The last 3 years have yielded a profit based on the rest of his runners at the festival, and most of those winners (10 of 12) have been aged 8 years or younger. Interestingly 9 of those winners had also had at least 1 run in the previous 90 days, so look for runners with a run or two under their belt.

System 91: Back Henry De Bromhead’s’ Cheltenham Runners in all but Handicap Chases and Handicap Hurdles aged 8yrs or less where they have had at least 1 run in the last 90 days.

THE STRONGER SEX

Last year we highlighted the successes of the Mares and Fillies at Cheltenham, as touched upon by Dave Renham in his earlier article in this issue.

2018-2020 had resulted in a profit with blind backing even with a lowly strike rate of 7.98%

We then went on to try and see if we could find an angle where we could capitalise on the fairer sex’s performances.

We “dug” down to particular race types and a number of specific trainers and if we had just backed blindly…. we’d have made almost 28 points profit!

The thing is backing 58 horses blindly means backing every runner in the mares’ races which just isn’t practical.

The one criterion we may be able to use to limit the numbers of runners is the age of the horse. There has only been 1 winner from 40 runners aged 8 years or older, and the 4 year olds are only 1 from 15 runs.

So, we are looking for female horses aged between 5 and 7.