Guest Post - Course Connoisseurs - by Ben Aitken (NTF)

On the Blog today we have a guest post from Ben Aitken; author of ‘Narrowing the Field - Using the Dosage Method to Win at National Hunt Racing’, owner and creator of racing web-site www.narrowing-the-field.co.uk and also a dedicated Proform user.

Ben has been a Proform user for some time now and today his detailed research has identified one of those special horses that shine at a specific track – the course specialist.

Over to Ben:

Course Connoisseurs

Course Connoisseurs, Track Specialists, Horses for Courses…… whatever you may call them these types of animals are well worth sourcing, analysing and getting to know and adding them to your punting weaponry.

I personally have an exhaustive and detailed list compromising of a vast array of horses and their individual preferences – horse profiling if you will. Amongst this list there are numerous ‘Course Connoisseurs’, 1 of which I want to share with you here today.

The horse in question is the Sean Regan trained MERIDIEM.

Why does my antenna start twitching when MERIDIEM runs at Towcester? Simple, he is a Towcester connoisseur!

Take a look at the 8yo’s form figures over the testing undulations of Towcester racetrack –

Towcester form figures – 2-1-2-2-1-1

A 50% WIN strike-rate and a 100% win & place strike-rate! Figures that tell me this is track he simply adores.

A quick squint at the RPR figures he has achieved also shows that he is yet to get within 13lbs of his Towcester form at any other track.

Now let’s take a look at his form figures away from his beloved Towcester –

Form figures away from Towcester - 0-0-9-4-7-3-0-5-9

A miserable set of figures I’m sure you will agree!

Clearly you need to take other factors into account when analysing the chances of any horse in a specific race but if you know the horse has a particular liking for a specific track, like MERIDIEM at Towcester, then you are already in the process of building up a profile on the horse and putting yourself in a strong position to stay ahead of the crowd.

I can also store specific horse notes on Proform and have the software alert me as to when MERIDIEM is running at his favourite track; no need for any manual checking and potentially missing him run.

In summary then we know that MERIDIEM…

• Has strong Towcester form (2-1-2-2-1-1)
• Has weak form elsewhere (0-0-9-4-7-3-0-5-9)

..and by looking at his CV a bit closer we also know that…

• His 3 wins at the track and 3 placed efforts have come over 2m (16f)
• He acts best on Good or better ground (record on ground with cut in it reads 9-4-7-3-9 compared to ground that is good or better 0-0-2-1-2-2-1-5-1)

He currently sits on a career high mark of 100 and despite running poorly from marks above 93 (93 being his previous highest winning mark) on the 2 occasions he has tried in the past it is important to note that those runs were NOT at his beloved Towcester. With only 15 runs under his belt (11 hurdle starts) it is not inconceivable that he could defy a mark above 93 when running at Towcester on Good or better ground.

On my website – www.narrowing-the-field.co.uk – I’m currently giving away a FREE ‘Course Connoisseurs’ guide when you sign up to my FREE NTF service. Simply pop your details in the sign-up box on this page - http://www.narrowing-the-field.co.uk – and you will be sent a link that allows you to download the FREE NTF Course Connoisseurs guide.

There are also numerous other FREE NTF guides you can download at the same time including my ‘Introduction to the Dosage Method’ guide.

The ‘Course Connoisseurs’ is a great example of one of the many angles you can create and source with the powerful Proform database.

Happy Punting

Ben Aitken (NTF)

Owner and creator of www.narrowing-the-field.co.uk and author of ‘Narrowing The Field – Using the Dosage Method to Win at National Hunt Racing’.