As another change of month occurs, Andrew Mount’s latest Myth Busters column is a fitting article for the time, as he points out how the time of year a race is run can give you a significant headstart on the bookies…
Two tipsters of my acquaintance, whose judgement I respect, both liked the chance of RAADOBARG in the 1m Sky Bet For The Fans Handicap at Haydock last Saturday, citing the soft going as a reason for him leaving his recent good-ground Doncaster defeat well behind him. One of them also asked me to dig out some stats for trainer George Boughey using a first-time visor, as the six-year-old was trying new headgear. However, I had the gelding flagged as a spring horse and neither were aware of the gelding’s poor record outside of the March to May period. Raadobarg, sent off at 7-1, finished sixth of eight, coming home over six lengths behind the winner and his record split by month now looks like this…
He has a 50% strike-rate in the spring (March to May) but has now lost all 18 starts from June onwards.
Finding value in horse racing betting markets revolves around finding factors that are over or under-represented, and time of year certainly seems to fall into this category, as does field size, a subject I will tackle in a future article. Seasonal preferences are quite common but rarely get discussed by journalists/pundits in the run-up to a race, unless it’s an obvious one like ‘horse x won this race last year’. Another obvious example is Tim Easterby’s BOARDMAN, whose record split by month looks like this…
The veteran has won six of his ten starts in the month of May but has a 0-31 record from June onwards.
Champions Day at Ascot is on the horizon and the time of year angle could help us to find some value bets. In 2019, Andrew Balding’s DONJUAN TRIUMPHANT provided followers of this method with a 33-1 winner in the British Champions Sprint Stakes. Going into the meeting, Donjuan Triumphant’s turf record in the autumn (September to November) stood at 21114001184312 (6-14), compared to 2322923924962486 (0-16) on turf in other months.
Karl Burke’s AL QAREEM has a similar profile to Donjuan Triumphant, recording form figures on turf in September/October of 15111 (4-5), with the sole defeat in the Group 1 Prix Royal-Oak at Longchamp in 2022. The five-year-old is entered in the Group 3 Cumberland Lodge Stakes at Ascot this Saturday (October 5th) as well as in the British Champions Long Distance Cup (October 19th). A win on Saturday could see him enter calculations on Champions Day.
There are also plenty of jumpers to look out for at this time of year, including CORRIGEEN ROCK (three from three in October), BALLINTUBBER BOY (three from three), AFFORDALE FURY (three from three), SOUL ICON (four from six) and UNO MAS (three wins and a 50-1 fourth from four October starts).
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