York Ebor Festival Stats

Hi all,

The final declarations for day one of York's Ebor Festival are out and in today’s main piece I’m concentrating on the festival. Inside you’ll find pace and draw stats as well as few trainers whose runners are worth keeping onside over the next four days. Plus, there's a pre York selection from this evening feature race at Worcester.

Small Fields Must Be A Worry For York

Just four were declared for the Group 1 Juddmonte International Stakes on Tuesday.

Desert Crown had been ruled out of the Tuesday feature on Sunday after sustaining another injury and trainer Sir Michael Stoute also didn’t declare Bay Bridge. That means just Paddington, Mostahdaf, Nashwa and The Foxes will compete for the £567,100 winners first prize.

It’s the smallest field for the International Stakes since Sea The Stars faced four rivals in 2009.  However, you spin it this must come as disappointment for the racecourse. The race has £1,000,000 guaranteed in prize money and the horse finishing last will pick £53,600.00 for a nice gallop on the Knavesmire and £107,600.00 for finishing third.

The small field sizes aren’t just reserved for the Tuesday’s Group 1 contest. The Group 3 Acomb Stakes has attracted six and the Group 2 Great Voltigeur Stakes just five runners. I suspect poor field sizes in the non-handicaps will be a trend over the four days.

York Ebor Festival Stats

Great prize money, great racing, and great crowds. Yes, it time for York’s Ebor Festival which gets underway on Wednesday.

The festival's name, “Ebor,” is derived from the Roman name for York, which was Eboracum. This historical connection adds a touch of tradition and heritage to the event.

The International Stakes, the Nunthorpe Stakes, The Yorkshire Oaks, the Lowther Stakes, and the Gimcrack Stakes are just five of the big races you can enjoy over the four days.  Add in the Ebor Handicap, which is the traditional centrepiece of the festival, the most valuable flat handicap run in Britain, and you have the best flat racing outside of Royal Ascot.

York is a left handed, flat track. There’s a long straight of 4 ½ f which suits galloping types who need time to hit full stride. If a horse is good enough, they should win.

When I began my punting journey back in the 80s horses would always stick to the far rail. However, in recent years the trend has been for runners in races on the round track to come down the centre in the straight, rather than go the shortest way down the far rail. 

Tom Segal (Pricewise) often wonders why jockey’s don’t take the shortest route anymore and its something that baffles me to.

Pace & Draw

Front runners tend to do well at the track but if they get racing to far out then you will often see the leaders being overhauled inside the final furlong.

Digging into www.horseracebase.com.

Pace Verdict: Apart from the few races where they go too hard up front. Up close to the pace is the place to be in sprint races and as the stats show they are profitable to back blind. The problem we don't know which horse will lead until the race has started.

Beyond the sprint trips there doesn’t seem to be a discernible pace bias in favour of front runners.

Draw

For this analysis, I have opted to look only at handicap races run at the Ebor Festival since 2009.  

5f & 5 ½ f

6f

7f

Mile

1m 2 ½ f

One mile & four furlongs

1m 6f

2m ½ f

Draw Verdict:

In races over 5f & 5 ½ f there is a slight bias toward lower drawn horse. Over 6f there’s also a slight bias towards those drawn lower and towards to the middle.

The races over 7f start on a chute which seems to switch the advantage to horses drawn middle to high.

In races over 1m there’s a short run into the bend. Jockey’s on horses drawn out wide face a dilemma. Do they use up their horses energy to get a handy position or do they drop in and ride for luck?

That tough choice is borne out in the stats as you can see from the number of placed horses drawn in the first two segments of the draw and the number of winners drawn in the first quarter.

In races beyond 1m there doesn’t seem to be any draw bias. Although looking at races between 1m 2 ½ & 1m 4f those drawn in the final quarter are 1 winner from 105 bets – 93, 12 placed.

Digging a bit deeper – 10 winners from 55 bets +74.5, 21 placed were drawn in stall 1 & 2.  Compared to 3 winners from 143 bets -113.5, 21 placed drawn 13 and higher.

Trainers:

For many punter trainers are the first point of call when it comes to looking at big racing festivals. Here are few worth noting.

Handicaps

Non-Handicaps

Two-year-olds

3-year-olds

4-year-olds & Older

One for the layers: Richard Fahey non juveniles.

Richard Fahey has a decent enough record with his juveniles at the Ebor Festival – 8 winners from 99 runners +17.75, 18 placed.

However, it appears that the owners of the Fahey 3-year-old plus seem to like a day out at the festival.  Since 2009 the trainers 3-year-old+ runners are 1 winner from 150 runners -141. 23 placed and you must go back to 2011 to find his last qualifying winner. Ouch!

There are few other yards whose runners I tend to avoid at the meeting, and this is one very much for the layers.

Trainer Verdict:

There are several yards whose runners I will make a note of over the next four days and I few that I will avoid.

York Ebor Festival: Trainer Micro Angle

Here’s a micro angle for the John & Thady Gosden yard at the Ebor Festival.

The yard has had 17 winners at the meeting since 2017 and 53% of them were qualifiers from the above angle.

Last year I put up a simple micro angle that has produced a 21% win strike rate at the Ebor Festival and had been profitable at the previous festivals. It delivered the goods again 12 months ago, but will it do so in 2023.

Here’s a quick reminder of this simple but logical system. You’re looking for 3-year-old’s and older, who had placed form at York and had finished first or second on their last start.

Yearly Breakdown:

There will be plenty of qualifiers over the week with multiple entries some races. So, you if you are going to follow this year’s qualifiers you can’t cherry pick them. It’s a case of all or nothing.  Last year I backed all the qualifiers to a few pounds at BFSP.

Of course, this could be the year that the angle bombs out, but I will be following them in once again.

If you haven’t got the time to find this year’s qualifiers, then you can get them along with all my York previews for a bargain £7.99.

Tuesday Preview

On the eve of York’s Ebor Festival its all about jumping today with fixtures at Newton Abbot and Worcester. Roscommon's evening card is today’s sole flat fixture.

Worcester

6:00 – Courtland completed a handicap chase hat trick when winning at Market Rasen before a personal best when ¾ length 2^nd of 14 in the Summer Plate (Handicap) at Market Rasen. The front two pulled clear of the rest last time so a 6lb rise in the weights looks workable. He stays an extended 2m 5 ½ f and if he stays 2m 7f it will be at a track like Worcester where he’s 2 wins from 3 starts. The 7/2 generally available probably reflects his true odds and nothing more. However, on a tough day for solid betting opportunities he will do for me.

Courtland – 7/2 @ Coral.

Good luck with your Tuesday bets.

John