Originally posted by archie
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We could create a number of new questions in analysing this but I randomly took the Coral Cup and the Pertemps final as two big handicaps, ironically, and not designed to suit my argument, the Irish have won the past three renewals of each but the interesting question is representation.
Coral Cup:
2016 26 runners 6 Irish
2017 25 runners 12 Irish
2018 26 runners 9 Irish
Pertemps:
2016 24 runners 5 Irish
2017 24 runners 5 Irish
2018 23 runners 5 Irish
So no the Irish success, even in years they performed less well, is disproportionate to number of horses.
No doubt these trends are reversed in the opening day 3m 'cap or the 2m 4f novice handicap chase where UK horses tend to do well and when I have more time I might look at the difference in hurdle 'caps compared to chases.
Again, and from memory, the Mildmay/Flete is a race the Irish never even contested let alone competed in until recently, yet I'm sure they've won the past 3/4 renewals having.
So what has changed ?
Are Irish trainers better than UK trainers, do they have better facilities, are their horses better prepared, are they deliberately run in wrong races, is there a difference in the approach adopted by each Nations handicapper ?
I don't know the answer to any of those questions but there has to be a reason why there is a disproportionate number of Irish handicap successes compared to percentage of runners.
No desire to do this to death if there's nothing to be gained but it would be useful to see how others view this....
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