Five Highly Profitable All Weather Jockeys To Follow

As part of a wider piece of research I’ve been doing, dear reader, I stumbled upon five jockeys that you should keep well on side this winter. This quintet contains a couple of well-known names and a couple of lesser known names. All are profitable to a pleasing degree in the context of the info presented below, so bear them in mind especially with the all weather racing season about to start.

The first of the five is…

Graham Gibbons

Graham Gibbons – Southwell / Wolves, September-March

Perhaps not a surprising choice, as a quick glance at the Racing Post jockey tables shows he’s had an incredible season. His 70 winners have yielded a strike rate of 13% and a profit at level stakes of £88.97.

Scratching a little deeper, and with the all weather racing season in mind, I noted that around the more northerly artificial tracks (Southwell and Wolverhampton), Gibbons was the man, especially between now and March.

His SP stats for 2008 up to now are below:

Bets     Wins     Strike Rate     Win %Return
443      57         12.9%                132.7%

Bets     Wins     Strike Rate     Win %Return
2008    98         16          16.3%                152.4%
2009    230      27         11.7%                136.9%
2010    115       14          12.2%                107.5%

Keep this chap in your mind this autumn and winter, and you could be do-do-do’ing the Funky Gibbons (remember Bill Oddie, TBT and Graeme Gardner?! Here’s a visual clue for our younger viewers…!)

Classic! OK, let’s get back to the boys to, erm, back…

Second in our ‘little people with whips’ hit parade is…

Martin Dwyer

Martin Dwyer – All Weather, January – April (goes off the boil Oct-Dec)

Again, Martin is hardly an unknown, having been banging in winners at a rate of 36 or more per year since 1996. But frequency of winners is only half the battle, and we need to combine that with the price of the runners (just look at the top eight in the jockey’s standings to see what I mean!)

Dwyer seems to be riding a lower class of horse this year, because his stats make most interesting reading. Although he’s earned £175,000 less for his owners from winning rides this season, his strike rate is actually 3% higher.

Our Martin seems to really taper off towards the end of the year, and it could be that – like most other people – he just needs a break. Certainly, his early season stats back that up, as from January to April he comes alive. Just following his progress on the all weather tracks in the first third of the calendar year has yielded fat juicy profits.
Bets     Wins     Strike Rate     Win %Return
288       51          17.7%               146.6%

Bets     Wins     Strike Rate     Win %Return
2008     26          5          19.2%                 224.0%
2009    147       21         14.3%                 85.7%
2010    115        25        21.7%                 207.0%

Moving on, and let’s now take a look at another Martin, this time the up and coming…

Martin Lane

Martin Lane young jockey – all weather…

Laney’s a fairly new kid on the block and has been working hard on his style this year, having ridden out his apprentice claim quite recently. He’s been effective on the sand, with the notable exception of Lingfield (0 wins from 19 starts this year) thus far. I suspect that is an aberration and will be following him across all four winter flat courses.

Bets     Wins     Strike Rate     Win %Return
115       13          11.3%              124.4%

He’s getting plenty of outside rides now, and could be a very profitable Lane to furrow (sorry!)

Three down, two to go in this five to follow feature. The penultimate rider in whom to entrust (some of) your hard earned is…

Francis Norton

Francis Norton – Southwell / Lingfield / Kempton (awful at Wolves!), November – April

‘Franny’ Norton is another chap to have been around the weighing room for a very long time. He’s had a pretty colourful career as well, and will make for excellent biography material in due course.

Amongst his racing highlights was a spell as John Gosden’s lightweight jockey of choice at Royal Ascot, and the pair teamed up to some effect in such races.

More recently, he’s found big rides in the south harder to come by, probably at least in part due to the addictive personality that has got him into trouble with the ‘beaks’. However, his performance on the all weather, with the exception of Wolverhampton bizarrely – and I’m all of a kerfuddle as to why – is noteworthy and likely to be profit-generating.

That level of profit kicks up a gear in the winter season, and our man Fran is a very, VERY strong jock. Definitely have him in your corner… In fact, that’s a fine turn of phrase for a pilot who was formerly a useful boxer: just one defeat in 50 fights.
Bets     Wins     Strike Rate     Win %Return
214    33    15.4%    167.7%

Bets     Wins    Strike Rate     Win %Return
2008    102     15        14.7%               87.3%
2009    35        8          22.9%               533.2%
2010    77       10        13.0%               108.0%

And, making up the famous five, is… well, a slightly less famous name. Step forward…

Jack Mitchell

Jack Mitchell – AW – public cottoned on?

Son of decent trainer (especially of all weather horses), Philip Mitchell, Jack is making a pretty good name for himself in the middle to lower echelons of his profession. And with a positive P&L at each of the four all weather tracks to his name over the last five seasons, our only concern now is that the public may cotton on to his ‘dirt dexterity’ and collapse the prices on a few of his horses.

Certainly, I don’t expect wor Jackie’s strike rate to diminish, but the question will be whether the odds are sufficient to sustain profitability as the boy becomes a known face… and let’s face it, that’s a pretty angelic face, no?!

His numbers bear close scrutiny, and I’d counsel you to back Jack on the AW tracks this winter.
Bets     Wins    Strike Rate     Win %Return
322       41        12.7%               121.7%

Bets     Wins    Strike Rate     Win %Return
2008     101       16        15.8%               128.4%
2009     115       14        12.2%                153.7%
2010     106       11        10.4%               80.7%

So , there it is. Five AW jocks to keep on the right side of. I’m really looking forward to the winter sand season (sad? moi?!), and I reckon we can turn a nice few quid from it too.

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I’m off to the London Racing Club night this evening, where Robert ‘Choc’ Thornton – stable jockey to Alan King – will be talking to Racing UK’s Nick Luck about his hopes for the season, his injury woes last year, and anything else that people from the audience might throw at him. If he mentions any promising horses, I’ll be sure to blow the whistle on them on the blog…! 😉

If you’re attending, and you see me, feel free to pop over and say hi.

Matt