Rowleyfile Preview: Imperial Cup 2018

Either you believe in the concept of “trainer form”, or you don’t and are likely to dismiss it as “noise” or “magical thinking”.

Those in the former camp – which includes me, albeit with some caution – believe that a trainer can do things, either intentionally or otherwise, which explain sudden uplifts or downturns in the form of not just individual horses but of all or most of a stable.

In support of the trainer-form notion is the fact that under-performing and over-performing trainers in one time period tend to under-perform or over-perform in the next, if to a lesser degree (a manifestation of the principle of “regression to the mean”).  

In other words, however you explain it, “trainer form” (or whatever you would like to call it) appears to have predictive power. All other things being equal, a trainer “in good form” can be expected to continue in good form, though that will erode over time.

My preferred way of measuring these things is to establish the % of rivals beaten for a trainer in handicaps in a given time period: %RB is a superior measure to many alternatives and handicaps only are used as success/failure in non-handicaps can owe much more to placement.

I would not normally start off one of these previews with what might seem like philosophical musings on the nature of analysis, were it not for the fact that there is one trainer with a runner in Saturday’s big race – the Matchbook Imperial Cup Handicap Hurdle at Sandown – who is in remarkably good “form” of late.

Doctor Richard Newland has only a small string, but he sure knows how to train, as his success in the 2014 Grand National, among other exhibits, illustrated.

From January 27 (Trials Day at Cheltenham) to the time of writing, Newland had 16 runners in jumps handicaps: six of them won (for an impact value of 2.6) and all but three of them made the first three.

In the process, those runners beat 80% of their rivals, which is a country mile clear of the other trainers with runners in Saturday’s contest and the kind of figure managed only occasionally by even the very top trainers.

The Newland horse in question in the Imperial Cup is Le Patriote, who was one of those winners when accounting for Friday Night Light at Ascot in February.

If you watch the video of that success, you are likely to appreciate why the horse improved for the application of cheekpieces that day, and you are also likely to think that he has every chance of confirming placings with the runner-up even on slightly worse terms.

Le Patriote travelled through that Ascot race like a dream before dossing when he hit the front. In Saturday’s race there is no shortage of horses likely to force the pace – five of the declared have Timeform EPFs below 2.0 – and Le Patriote’s jockey is likely to be able to play him as late as he wants.

The aforementioned Friday Night Light comes quite close to qualifying as the “trends” horse, which these previews aim to acknowledge (and sometimes even tip). I contemplated putting up both horses but will be sticking with just one. Nonetheless, here are what some of the leading 10-year trends say about the Imperial Cup.

Younger horses have over-performed marginally, as have last-time winners, horses with good chances on Timeform ratings (though neither by as much as might be expected) and horses running off low BHA marks. But those trends are by no means strong.

Perhaps the most interesting finding is that horses who have run more than four times in the current season have fared better than those that have not: experience may be a help, especially in what is usually a large field of handicappers.

Le Patriote has had six runs this campaign, the first three when still trained in France, has plenty of experience.

The field size for the Imperial Cup has dropped below 19 only three times in the last decade. It does so again here, but at 17 declared it is still pretty big, and, importantly, it lends itself to each-way betting.

The over-round on the win book (the theoretical price of having a bet) at early prices is 123%, but it is just 97% for a place, assuming one-quarter those win odds for four places, which means that you could guarantee a profit on the latter if fixed-odds bookmakers allowed you to bet place only.

They don’t, but a win and place bet – aka an each-way bet – remains mathematically superior to a win-only bet, and these things matter over time. It is possible you will get even better terms closer to the event.

Recommendation:

1 pt each way LE PATRIOTE, ¼ the odds first four places