Stat of the Day, 29th April 2014

Stat of the Day

Stat of the Day, 29th April 2014

Another placer yesterday to take the tally to 11 placed horses from the last 12 selections, but finishing third as a 6/4 favourite (advised at 9/4 BOG) doesn’t improve the bottom line.

Yesterday was only Spectator’s fourth race and it showed late on when he looked very green in the closing stages. 7lb claiming jockey Kieran Shoemark actually gave a decent ride, holding the horse up for a late run and he looked to have every chance with a furlong to run, but the greenness caused him to veer off a true line and he didn’t produce any extra when needed.

The end result was a third place finish, a length and a half off the pace, but based on what I saw, both horse and jockey will be winning races fairly soon.

I, however, would like to be winning races now and I’m hoping to do so in today’s…

6.50 Newcastle:

Where rising star Jason Hart claims 3lbs aboard Sirpertan for first-season trainer Mark Walford, whose charge can currently be backed at 4/1 BOG.

Mark Walford may be a new addition to the training ranks, but his father Tim is an old hand at this game and Mark has taken over the yard at Cornborough Manor, Sheriff Hutton near York after his father’s retirement. Mark is training the same horses as his father did and having worked as his father’s assistant, I’m fairly confident that there has been little change in the Walford M.O. which brings me to the first reason for selecting Sirpertan for this mile and a half, Class 6 handicap.

In the seven seasons (2008/13) prior to his retirement, Tim Walford trained 54 winners from his 305 runners in handicaps priced at 12/1 or shorter. That’s a pretty decent 17.7% strike rate which yielded handsome profits of 111.7pts at Betfair SP (the closest approximation to early BOG prices that I have), which is a return of almost 37p on top of every pound wagered.

Mark has hit the ground running already this season with two winners from seven for 15.35pts, taking the overall Team Walford stats to 56/312 (17.95% SR) for 127.05pts (+40.72% ROI).

The second string to today’s bow is the positivity surrounding the booking of talented claimer Jason Hart, who many of you will already recognise as one of Geegeez’ jockeys to follow.

Jason is one of the best claimers around and his record when riding with a claim (3, 4, 5 or 7lbs) is excellent for an inexperienced rider. To date he has ridden 69 winners from 538 rides with a claim, a 12.83% strike rate bringing home 210.9pts (+39.2% ROI) profit from all runners. There are, naturally, some longer priced horses in there and we would tend to discard them for SotD purposes.

62 of the 69 winners came from the 367 horses priced at 12/1 or under, meaning that almost 90% of the winners came from just 68% of the runners and this 62/367 record is better than one-in-six at 16.9% with a profit yield of 111.3pts or 30.3% of stakes invested.

From the 62/367 record, the numbers with a 3lb claim like today currently stand at 31 winners from 179 races, a 17.32% strike rate generating 75.67pts profit, an ROI of some 42.3%.

Sirpertan was well backed on his seasonal reappearance just 20 days when he was stepped up in trip by some three and a half furlongs, but his hood slipped that day and he had to be pulled up very early into the race. We can also make excuses for his poor show last time out when he was upped to Class 5 off a mark of 58 and was running from outside of the weights in a much stronger heat than this.

Today’s race looks like they’ve turned the clock back three weeks, it’s a similar kind of contest to what he was expecting at Catterick for his first run of the year: it’s the same trip, he’s off the same mark of 50, the hood is on again and the ground is declared as soft, just as it was at Catterick.

Sirpertan has a decent draw in stall 2 and I’d expect him to attract attention in the market as the day progresses, which should make our 4/1 BOG bet look decent value later, especially if Jason Hart keeps him handily placed in the race, as I expect he will.

So, the play today is a 1pt win bet on Sirpertan at 4/1 BOG. A few firms are offering this price and I’ve gone with Bet365, but to see exactly who is offering what…

…click here for the latest betting on the 6.50 Newcastle

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REMINDER: THERE IS NO STAT OF THE DAY ON SUNDAYS

Here is today’s racecard.