Rooster Booster
Fat Jockey Patron (est. Jan 2021)
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Agree it's a fair point & history tells us very few do repeat (bar the exceptional). When we take this year's race in to context though - who are the "fresher younger horses" that could finish ahead of APT realistically? IMO the likeliest to finish nearest to him are those who are the same age or older & have got the same sort of mileage on the clock (Galvin 8yo & Minella Indo 9yo).
The younger horses in the race - Chantry House 7yo & Protektorat 7yo both have at least 10lb to find on ratings & although not out of the question come March, that's a lot to find against a horse who's jumping this season since the GC has visibly been far better.
ABP & Champ are 10yos. Next on the list are Tornado Flyer, Royal Pagaille & Fiddlerontheroof who are all 8yos like APT and again on ratings have it all to do. Then it's another 10yo Lostintranslation.
I was trying to find an angle into this earlier in the season with Imperial Aura who for his age is relatively lightly raced but has run like a dog throughout & has limited appeal to even get round on current evidence.
Eklat De Rire is again a lightly raced 8yo but has mountains to find on ratings vs APT and is seemingly held.
So although that trend is proven, the main take I have on this year's Gold Cup is that all of APT's main opponents are the same age or older & he goes there having already improved on last year's GC run with his jumping which I think will edge him ahead...
By definition the younger fresher horses will often have plenty to find on the book as they have yet to have the opportunity to run in such a deep senior race as a gold cup and it’s usually these types of race where horses are awarded their highest rating.
Protektorat as an example has only had 7 chase starts and only two at 3 miles. His last two rprs are his highest ever and his most recent is 9 pounds higher than anything else and achieved at what was his first proper go at 3 miles (if you ignore the Kelso debacle where even the trainer admitted it was a monumental mistake to run him). So we have an improving 7 year old that evidence suggests is improving both with age and with distance.
A plus tard has had 13 chase starts nearly double and many of those have been at the top table which is really tough.His latest RPR is identical to Protektorat. APT needs to raise his game back to haydock levels and hope Protektorat a fast improving second season chaser doesn’t improve again. Yes these two things are quite possible but history tells us it is far less likely than the market would have us believe.