Champion Hurdle Trials By Time

As race readers have got smarter it has become harder to gain an edge over the market by simply looking at form or comparing times.

Simon Rowlands has been pushing the boundaries with his work on sectional timings at Timeform and it is an approach we have adopted with success on the flat.

The premise revolves around timing sections of the race, usually the final 2f and seeing how this impacts on the overall time.

With Cheltenham just around the corner we have adapted the methodology for National Hunt racing.

Champion Hurdle Trials

Before we analyse the times it is worth pointing out several caveats with the data. 

National Hunt data is notoriously unreliable, races aren’t run over the advertised distances, obstacles move, there a few signposts to time from and that is before we even discuss the idiosyncrasies of the course and going. 

Where possible, our final sectional is taken from two or three obstacles before the finish line but don’t take the figure as gospel.

From a sectional point of view, there are three areas of interest.

Christmas Hurdle (26 Dec)
Faugheen justified favouritism for the Champion Hurdle with an impressive victory at Kempton on Boxing Day. The race was run at a solid gallop (99.8% is close to par) and the speed rating (TS) was good. It’s hard to find any chinks in his armour. 

The New One Lacks Sparkle
The New One’s victory at Haydock (17 Jan) is best ignored, run on desperate ground it was impossible to generate a speed rating from the meeting. The conditions couldn’t have been further from what he’ll encounter at the Festival.

His performance in winning the International Hurdle (13 Dec) is a better guide but again he lacked sparkle. The race was run at a solid gallop but the speed rating was no more than average. Note the low finishing speed (92.6%) reflects the stiff finish at the track.

Irish Form
Hurricane Fly maintained his 100% record at Leopardstown but he will be vulnerable at Cheltenham. Both races at Leopardstown favoured speed with the Ryanair Hurdle (29 Dec) being a much sharper test than usual because the race was run tight on the inside track.

Arctic Fire comes out with the most credit from the races. He let Jezki and Hurricane Fly twice get first run on him but each time was closing them down at the finish.

The Champion Hurdle promises to be run at a faster pace on a stiffer track and that could play into his hands. He was runner-up in the County Hurdle last year and could run into a place at 16/1 (Stan James).