Rowleyfile Preview: Coral Cup

You may not agree with the conclusions reached later in this piece, but you should agree with the following statement: “The Coral Cup at Cheltenham on Wednesday is an excellent race for each-way bettors”.

It comes down to simple arithmetic. The percentage on the win market of the race is 112 at the best early prices on offer, meaning that if bookmakers could lay every horse in strict proportion to their odds they would return £100 for every £112 staked and pocket the difference.

The percentage for the place market, at one quarter of those win odds, is 386. That would be appealing enough if there were four places on offer, but several bookmakers are offering five places on this particular race.

In other words, the percentage per-place is 77 (386 divided by 5) with five places on offer. In theory at least, you would need to stake only £77 to get the same £100 return.

You cannot bet place-only on such a market (for what should now be obvious reasons), but you can back win and place at the same time, aka each-way. And so you should!

Finding one of the quintet to place – and maybe even win – in what is a 26-runner field does not become any easier as a result, but the expectation for trying is decidedly positive.

Let us look first at the ten-year trends for the race, with higher first-four impact values and % of rivals beaten being of particular interest, as usual.

There are no truly overwhelming trends there, but: five-year-olds have a good record (winning and placing nearly twice as often as chance); last-time winners have done well (very well judged on wins alone, which have come at a rate nearly three times chance); and one win in the current season, rather than no wins or more than one win, has been a positive.

Those “absence” figures – all the last 10 winners had been off for more than four weeks – are far less exciting when it is realised that only three horses in this year’s field fail to qualify on that score.

BHA mark has been divided into quartiles as a result of official marks inflating significantly over the years, so that absolute marks would have been misleading. There is a slight bias towards higher-rated horses over lower-rated horses.

I also looked at trainer performance in handicaps-only since the end of January. There are some surprisingly poor % RB figures in there, including for Willie Mullins (39.5%) and Philip Hobbs (41.1%). Paul Nicholls – who turns out two well-fancied five-year-olds in Politologue and Baoulet Delaroque – is comfortably best with 59.2%.

Readers of the recent Timeform Timing Preview will be familiar with the latter horse, who was put up as of interest for handicaps at the Festival. Baoulet Delaroque has strong overall times to his name in victory at Wincanton and Huntingdon, as well as some sound sectionals.

There is a slight concern about how he might cope with drying ground given that he (along with most of the horse population) has been tackling softer in recent months.

First-day times and sectionals suggested that it was more like “good” than “good to soft”. What Baoulet Delaroque is not is a sluggard, however. Each of those wins made that point.

Diamond King does not qualify in terms of age – quite the opposite in that he is an eight-year-old – but there is a lot to like about him otherwise, including the fact that he is the only horse in the field with one win to his name this campaign with that win coming last time out.

He has raced only on going softer than good since leaving Donald McCain in the summer, running well in handicaps before winning a minor event at Punchestown, giving weight to the useful and consistent mare Jennies Jewel.

The ground might be imagined to be a concern for Diamond King, also, but it is worth noting that he put up one of the bumper performances of the 2012/2013 season when winning under a penalty at Bangor by 19 lengths on good going.

He looked like a gelding destined for big things that day, and he gets his opportunity on the big stage nearly three years on.

One thing which may be in Diamond King’s favour is that he tends to be held up, and there looks like being a good, if not necessarily suicidal, pace in this. Several of the runners have Timeform Early Position Figures of 2.2 or less, indicating the likelihood of a forward position in the opening exchanges. Baoulet Delaroque has a pace-tracking profile.

This is a tough race to crack, but bets on this pair look worthwhile, and each-way is the way to go.

Recommendations: 1 pt each-way DIAMOND KING, 0.5 pt each-way BAOULET DELAROQUE, both at ¼ the odds first 5 places