Comments on: Grand National 2010: Ways To Narrow Down The Field

By: Benny

Benny — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:09:07 +0000

Every year I narrow it down to 4-5 horses. I want to be able to confidently say that I like just one horse.

By: Neil S

Neil S — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 21:35:02 +0000

According to my book the stats will get you 8 out of 11 wins. Even if it didn’t get another winner it got me Earth Summit, Red Marauder (didn’t back),Smarty (2nd), silver birch, whatup boys(2nd) , Amberleigh House, Mon Mome (didn’t back). At £2.95 in 1993 good value for money.

By: Daniel Edwards

Daniel Edwards — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 21:10:17 +0000

such as Comply or Die and Numbersixvalverde in the past 5 years alone…

By: Neil S

Neil S — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 19:16:26 +0000

The way I worked out the national upto last year was using these stats, which I know are outdated now, but hey it got last’s years winner.

Weight 10-01 to 11-05. When written a lot of animals ran in the long handicap, since Phil done the handicap I admit you rarely see an animal in the long handicap now but the top end of the range takes care of those occasional horses above 11 stone.

Age 8-12 years old, 8 year olds seems to be winning less I can see this admended to 9 to 11 year olds soon.

Stamina, ignore all horses who haven’t won over 3 miles, favour horses which have won or performed well over longer distances in good company. Since reading Nick’s Mordin Betting for a living I’ve upped this distance to 3 1/4 miles.

Class (OR) a range of 136-157 is used. Highest OR now in decade is 148.

Best Trial races, I started with a list of five, Hennessy, Welsh National, London National (used to be Anthony Mildmay/Peter Cazalet Memorial Chase, William Hill Handicap at cheltenham festival (used to be Ritz Club Trophy Handicap Chase) and Racing Post Handicap Chase. Was unhappy with this limited range so I took the suggestions made on this site.

Then I added Nick’s suggestions.

Eliminate any with headgear saying you have to have unrestricted vision to see and avoid terrific travel problems.

Eliminate any Novice Chasers in this and last seasons.

Eliminate any horse who hasn’t got upto 3rd place in a field of 13 or more.

Once in a while you might get an exceptional animal who will break one or two rules.

By: andy

andy — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 09:33:49 +0000

missed out a win in last 10 chases. as stephen say’s all trying to get down to a manageable number any way we can.

By: andy

andy — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 09:26:37 +0000

as stephen above +
between 2-8 prep runs,no more than 2 career falls,start with weight 11-5 then if i still have too many horses then weight 11-1,won over 25f +placed over at least 27f.
think we all use pretty much the same,we just tweak them a little.

By: Stephen

Stephen — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 21:13:22 +0000

There are an endless list of trends floating about to be honest. The twelve I have listed are just the tweleve that I will be using personally to narrow down the field. They are the ones I can understand the reasoning behind why they would throw up the winner. But, as stated above, they are open to manipulation. For instance, if a horse meets 11/12 of the trends and misses out on the final trend by, say, having finished 6th in the Hennessy instead of 5th, then that wouldn’t put me off.

At the end of the day the stats and trends are a guide, a pointer in the right direction. We all know if a 6 year old with 5 chase runs turns up in the race then it has a smaller probability of winning than an experienced 9 year old does. So I would expect the winner to adhere to either 11 or 12 of the above trends, and at a push 10. They are simply an easy guide to follow to try and narrow down such a large field.

By: Neil S

Neil S — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 19:23:12 +0000

If your using the above trends then I thought that left handed RPR 141 was one of the trends. So is RPR -OR = 7 or better.

By: Stephen

Stephen — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 14:10:41 +0000

Well the twelve trends I shall be using to narrow down the field initially will be…

1. Age 8 to 12
2. Won 1+ Chases over 3m+
3. Run in 10+ Chases
4. Won a Class 2+ Chase
5. Won a Chase worth £17,000+
6. Weight no greater than 12lbs above bottom weight
7. Top 3 finish in a Class 1 Chase over 3m+
8. Top 3 finish in any of previous 3 runs
9. TopSpeed Rating of 128+
10. RacingPostRating of 144+
11. Last run no greater than 50 days
12. Top 5 finish in Newbury Hennessy
OR Top 3 in Irish, Scots or Welsh National
OR Top 2 in a race over Aintree National fences
OR 3+ Chase wins at 3m+ (one being at 3m 4f+)

Once the forty runners are declared and I apply these trends it should leave me with a few possibles.

I will also look to include two runners that match ten or eleven of these trends as the trends are there to be broken and moulded each year that passes.

So I will end up with a list of four or five runners made up of a couple from the trends that are a 100% fit and a couple that are a 90-95% fit percent of the trends.