Unlucky horses in-running are so often put into tracker immediately to try and find some value on them next time out. However, Andrew Mount analyses whether such horses take up too much of the market, and whether your bets are better placed elsewhere.
For several years I wrote a weekly Eyecatchers column for GG.co.uk and still do so for weekly newspaper (younger readers may need to ask their parents) Racing & Football Outlook. The horses who feature in these columns fit various profiles – newcomers who ran green and are likely to improve, those who were running under unsuitable conditions (e.g. wrong going, distance, time of year etc), horses who ran well against a draw and/or pace bias and those who were obviously unlucky in-running.
The last group might include jumpers who were clear when falling at the last obstacle, horses full of running but denied a clear passage and those who were ridden tenderly with an eye to future targets. In this article I want to study those deemed “unlucky” or “eyecatcher” (only introduced recently) and investigate whether they make good bets at the next time of asking.
“Unlucky” is rarely used in the in-running comments of the database I use, with only 60 incidents since the beginning of 2021. Only ten of these went on to win their next start and backing them all would have returned a loss of £27.92 to a £1 level stake at SP…
In the same period, 77 runners received the comment “eyecatcher” and 21 of those were successful on their next outing for a profit of £12.18 to a £1 level stake at SP (+£26.38 at Betfair SP after 2% commission)…
Splitting these by handicaps/non-handicaps is most revealing, with the handicappers showing a big profit and the non-handicappers producing a loss…
…this adds some weight to the theory that the last time out “eyecatchers” were being targeted at a future race, though they might just have been classed as “eyecatchers” because they finished close-up after a slow start.
These are obviously small sample sizes but those last time out “eyecatchers” look worth monitoring closely. The most recent qualifier is MAKES ME WONDER, who finished a 200-1 sixth of 13 (beaten by seven lengths) in a 7f novice contest at Chelmsford, his third run for a handicap mark. The handicapper has given him a rating of 59 and David Simcock’s juvenile should be able to exploit that in nursery company in the coming weeks. Please note: the comments saved in the software I use are from the Press Association and not the Racing Post, who didn’t use the word “eyecatcher” in their close-up for Makes Me Wonder, instead opting for “slowly into stride, towards rear, going okay when not clear run over 1f out, soon switched left, some headway inside final furlong, no impression”.
One other aspect to consider when looking at horses who were obviously unlucky last time out is field size. Comments such as “hampered”, “not clear run” and “switched” crop up with great regularity in some horses’ close-up comments but punters, especially those who had backed the animal in question, tend to regard these as unlucky losers rather than ask “why did my horse meet trouble in running?”. Often the answer is because they prefer small fields, this is especially true of fillies, who are usually smaller than their male rivals, and front-runners, who are less likely to face competition for the lead in a small field. When writing my Trend Horses series of horses to follow books for Raceform I used to split field size into three categories – seven or fewer runners, eight to 11 runners and 12 or more runners and I still find these useful. JORDAN ELECTRICS is a good example of how this splitting method can help to identify a small-field preference…
7 or fewer runners: 3344212656431464111211 (8-22) +£0.22 to a £1 level stake at SP
8-11 runners: 88401056431825621816141117 (8-26) +£29.70
12 or more runners: 10445002299500670000339025 (1-26) -£21.00
…Jim Goldie’s veteran won his first every big-field start but has blanked in his 25 subsequent such outings. In the past two years only, his record in fields of 11 or fewer runners stands at 11614111211117 (10-14) for a profit of £34.60. We often see sprinters easily make the transition from good handicapper to Listed/Group winner and it’s often because they prefer small fields and are more likely to encounter them in the better races.
Front-runner SECRET HANDSHEIKH is another who seems to conform to the small-field pattern – he’s lost all 32 starts in fields of eight or more runners but has won ten of his 26 starts in fields of seven or less (+14.70). He’s due to run in a field of eight runners at Brighton this afternoon (Tuesday, October 8th).
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