Horse Racing

Tuesday Southwell top racing tip: Jason Hart booking could give Papa Stour the edge

Steve JonesSteve Jones31 January 2023
racing at Southwell

racing at Southwell

Tipstrr racing expert Steve Jones is hoping the successful all-weather pairing of jockey Jason Hart and trainer Stuart Williams can bring out the best of Papa Stour at Southwell on Tuesday night.

This older-horse sprint handicap is billed as a Class 3 but the top-rated runners are off a mark of 85, so it is effectively an upper-tier Class 4 event. 

That being the case, Papa Stour has been underestimated, because not only did he run a promising race in Class 3 last time out, but his revised rating of 83 is his lowest since he won an upper-tier Class 4 contest by an easy two lengths when today's rider, Jason Hart, was booked to partner him over a mile as a five-year-old.

Hart has a fine record when partnering this eight-year-old, having won on him twice and finished runner-up once from a total of only four previous bookings.
The last of those was back in January 2021, so it looks very significant that the jockey is brought back to partner Papa Stour once again after a gap of two years.

18:30 (Southwell) Papa Stour

Hart also boasts very fine career figures of 10/46 when riding for Newmarket trainer Stuart Williams on the all-weather (plus an additional seven placed rides).

After racing over seven furlongs and a mile for almost all his career, Papa Stour re-invented himself as a sprinter as a six-year-old, and the move paid off as he recorded two wins over the shorter trip, including a Class 2 handicap at Kempton this time last season.

It was a small-field contest but he beat two very useful rivals rated 93 and 104 (way ahead of today's standard) and he is now four pounds lower and effectively two grades lower, so he has to be of strong interest.

The last time he ran over this distance on Tapeta was back in his six-year-old season, when he finished second of 11 in a strong Class 3 contest when racing off 86, so again he has to be a big player here off 83, especially on the back of a promising run at Kempton earlier in the month.

He had not shown anything on his seasonal return last November, but that was in a strong Class 2 after 228 days off, after which he was given another couple of months to recharge.

After that seasonal opener, it was significant to see the money come for him in an 11-runner 0-95 Class 3 at Kempton over this trip.

He was backed in from 25/1 to 10/1 in the last few minutes before the start, and that money was on the right lines because he missed the places by less than a length, and would have finished a lot closer had he broken more smartly because he was doing some good work in the closing stages.

Today's Tapeta track has a long home straight, which will give this winner of longer trips plenty of time to get into full stride and he would not need to improve much on his latest 0-95 performance to go close in this lesser 0-85 event, especially if he starts more alertly under Jason Hart.

Of the others, the favourite Justcallmepete has to go on the shortlist, even though he doesn't represent a huge amount of value at his current prices.

This progressive four-year-old comes here full of confidence following four successive wins, the last three of which were over this very trip.

Dougie Costello has ridden him to all four of those recent successes and, even though the partnership only scraped home by a short head here last time, and is another three pounds higher today, the four-year-old remains unbeaten with a 4/4 record in blinkers, and he will surely go very well once again from a handy inside draw.

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