charlie
Fat Jockey Patron (est. March 2021)
I'd never even heard of this lad then I looked up his price! 660k ffs.
As a general rule of thumb I try not to back any British trained novice hurdlers ante post, it's just not something that works out historically well. The Irish have won 22 out of the last 30 novice Grade 1 hurdles at Cheltenham and their dominance looks on the up, so I think it pays to focus on them. Look at the Gallaghers - in last 5 years 1 British trained horse has placed, just 1. IMO it pays to focus on the Irish and fight the temptation to try and find the next big thing trained here. All the numbers tell you is you'll come up short. The only exception here is Nicky, but I've wasted so many points over the years trying to find his Supreme horse and his record in the Gallagher is terrible, so again I try and avoid.
That dominance plays to our favour though in the market. British trained horses tend to be much better prices after we've seen them. Yes, you may miss out on 33's about a horse like Regents Stroll, but even if he looked awesome he might be cut to 10's whereas if it was one of Willies it would be 7/2. BMG was touted as the second coming by PN and you could back him at 7's the week before Cheltenham. This is just a personal preference, but i'd rather weigh in with 5 points at that price with a ton of information and a good idea of what will line up, than chuck a point at 33's now effectively betting in the dark. I've learnt over the years that those points here and there particularly at this time of the season add up and damage your P&L, and I say that as something who backed Shishkin at 33's (will never tire of mentioning that) and still haven't turned a profit on British trained novice hurdlers over the last 10 years!
In the case of Paul Nicholls specifically, I wouldn't touch anything of his ante post over hurdles for Cheltenham because his three favourite words appear to be 'wait for aintree'. He's a trainer you'd associate with staying chasers and he appears to look for any reason not to run horses and give them time. He avoided Cheltenham with Regents Stroll and scrapped running arguably one of his exciting novices in Caldwell Potter at all. Fair play to him, the patience approach can work well and he says what he thinks, but I think its a mistake backing any of his ante post without a really good reason to do so and by that, I mean Paul has specifically said they will go to Cheltenham.
