The build up to the Cheltenham Festival has been going on for a few weeks now and there are just a few days to go before the festival begins. I wanted to very much write something about the festival this year but I wasn’t sure what. I have seen lots of posts about free bets and how to maximise these as well as a few more general posts but I wanted to write something unique.
I have decided that most people are gearing up to watch the Gold Cup and having not seen much written specifically about that race I thought I would use this post to look at it. The Gold Cup will be taking place at 3.20pm on Friday 19th. This post shall take a look at what types of horses have previously won this big race which boasts a £475,000 prize fund this year.
Let’s start by taking a look at which trainers has historically performed well in this race.
| Trainer | Runners | Winners | Win S/R | P/L to SP | ROI to SP |
| A King | 4 | 0 | 0 | -4 | -100 |
| D Nicholson | 5 | 0 | 0 | -5 | -100 |
| F Doumen | 4 | 0 | 0 | -4 | -100 |
| Ferdy Murphy | 5 | 0 | 0 | -5 | -100 |
| G Richards | 3 | 0 | 0 | -3 | -100 |
| Jonjo O’Neill | 6 | 0 | 0 | -6 | -100 |
| M C Pipe | 18 | 0 | 0 | -18 | -100 |
| M F Morris | 2 | 1 | 50 | 6.5 | 325 |
| Michael Hourigan | 9 | 0 | 0 | -9 | -100 |
| Miss H C Knight | 6 | 3 | 50 | 6.35 | 105.87 |
| N J Henderson | 5 | 0 | 0 | -5 | -100 |
| Noel T Chance | 3 | 2 | 66.67 | 23.5 | 783.33 |
| P Bowen | 6 | 0 | 0 | -6 | -100 |
| P F Nicholls | 23 | 4 | 17.39 | 2.25 | 9.78 |
| P J Hobbs | 4 | 0 | 0 | -4 | -100 |
| R H Alner | 7 | 1 | 14.29 | 19 | 271.43 |
| T J Taaffe | 2 | 1 | 50 | 3 | 150 |
| W P Mullins | 6 | 0 | 0 | -6 | -100 |
The above table does not of course include all trainers; I have limited it to the trainers who have had more than 2 runners and not won any races or those that have won previously. We can see that M C Pipe and Michael Hourigan have particularly bad records while M F Morris, Miss Knight, Noel Chance, PF Nichols and R H Alner have good records. These are the trainers that we may want to keep an eye out for on the race day.
If we break down the past results by jockeys we get:
| Jockey | Runners | Winners | Win S/R | P/L to SP | ROI to SP |
| A Dobbin | 7 | 0 | 0 | -7 | -100 |
| A P McCoy | 12 | 1 | 8.33 | 9 | 75 |
| A Thornton | 5 | 1 | 20 | 21 | 420 |
| B J Geraghty | 7 | 1 | 14.29 | -2 | -28.57 |
| C Llewellyn | 4 | 0 | 0 | -4 | -100 |
| C O’Dwyer | 4 | 1 | 25 | 4.5 | 112.5 |
| G Lee | 4 | 0 | 0 | -4 | -100 |
| J Culloty | 3 | 3 | 100 | 9.35 | 311.73 |
| J Tizzard | 5 | 0 | 0 | -5 | -100 |
| M A Fitzgerald | 9 | 1 | 11.11 | 8 | 88.89 |
| N Williamson | 5 | 0 | 0 | -5 | -100 |
| P Carberry | 7 | 0 | 0 | -7 | -100 |
| P J Brennan | 3 | 0 | 0 | -3 | -100 |
| R Dunwoody | 3 | 0 | 0 | -3 | -100 |
| R Johnson | 6 | 1 | 16.67 | -0.5 | -8.33 |
| R Thornton | 5 | 0 | 0 | -5 | -100 |
| R Walsh | 9 | 2 | 22.22 | -4 | -44.44 |
| S Durack | 3 | 0 | 0 | -3 | -100 |
| S Thomas | 4 | 1 | 25 | -0.75 | -18.75 |
| T J Murphy | 9 | 0 | 0 | -9 | -100 |
| T Scudamore | 4 | 0 | 0 | -4 | -100 |
Again I have only included those trainers with more than 2 runs in the cup or who have made a profit. You will notice that there is only one jockey, J Culloty, who has won this race with less than 3 runs. It is also interesting to see that while R Walsh has a very good strike rate for this race he has been non-profitable over all. There are only a few riders who have shown a profit to flat stakes in this race but I am also interested in strike rates with 8 of the jockeys having a good strike rate and while A P McCoy has a lower 8.33% strike rate he has made a very healthy profit.
Two more factors below are the number of days since the horse last raced and SP rank.
| DSLR Ranges | Runners | Winners | Win S/R | P/L to SP | ROI to SP |
| 0-7 | 16 | 1 | 6.25 | 5 | 31.25 |
| 8-14 | 2 | 0 | 0 | -2 | -100 |
| 15-21 | 14 | 0 | 0 | -14 | -100 |
| 22-28 | 19 | 0 | 0 | -19 | -100 |
| 29-42 | 29 | 3 | 10.34 | 2.5 | 8.62 |
| 43-56 | 40 | 2 | 5 | -17.5 | -43.75 |
| 57-90 | 22 | 4 | 18.18 | -3.63 | -16.48 |
| 91-150 | 20 | 1 | 5 | -18.27 | -91.36 |
| 150+ | 19 | 1 | 5.26 | -10.5 | -55.26 |
This is very interesting and we can see that 87.5% of all the winners in previous Cheltenham Gold Cup races have not raced with 29 days of the cup. This would also make sense due to a trainer not wanting their horse to be worn out for what is likely to be the biggest race of the year.
| SP Rank | Runners | Winners | Win S/R | P/L to SP | ROI to SP |
| 1 | 12 | 5 | 41.67 | 2.35 | 19.6 |
| 2 | 14 | 2 | 14.29 | -5.25 | -37.5 |
| 3 | 13 | 2 | 15.38 | 3.5 | 26.92 |
| 4 | 10 | 0 | 0 | -10 | -100 |
| 5 | 16 | 0 | 0 | -16 | -100 |
| 6 | 11 | 0 | 0 | -11 | -100 |
| 7 | 14 | 0 | 0 | -14 | -100 |
| 8 | 11 | 1 | 9.09 | 6 | 54.55 |
| 9 | 10 | 0 | 0 | -10 | -100 |
| 10 | 15 | 2 | 13.33 | 32 | 213.33 |
From the above table you can see that 76% of the winners come from the top 3 in the betting. We have had 3 runners in the last 12 years that have come from further down in the field and these are of course the ones that have made the best profit. This is not to say that the winner cannot come from even lower down in the betting than position 10. As we saw in last year’s Grand National anything can happen in these large races where the best runners compete against each other.
I have highlighted a few of the trends from previous years Cheltenham Gold Cup Festivals and next week on Friday Morning, I shall use this information along with some other form analysis to do a preview of the Gold Cup.
2 Comments