Aintree trends analysis racing tip: Chambard can stay and offer value in Becher Handicap Chase
Chambard ridden by Lucy Turner on their way to winning the Virgin Bet Free Bets for Winners Novices' Handicap Steeple Chase at Fontwell Park Racecourse. Picture date: Thursday February 17, 20
Back over the Grand National fences for the Becher Chase at Aintree on Saturday, December 9 and racing tipster Andrew of Fiosrach aims his popular trends analysis at the feature race on the card.
14:05 Aintree Becher Handicap Chase
A decent couple of meetings this weekend with Aintree and Sandown to the fore, but very small fields in some races create few betting opportunities.
I am looking at the Becher Chase from Aintree which is run over the Grand National fences over a shorter trip than the big race.
I have used the trends below to reduce the field from an initial fourteen runners to a more manageable three or four:
19/21 - Aged 8+
17/21 – Had won between 2-5 times over fences before
17/21 – Had won over at least 3m (fences) before
17/21 – Had no more than 1 start that season
16/21 – Had raced within the last 7 weeks
16/21 – Carried 10-12 or less
14/21 – Had run over these Grand National-style fences before
15/21 – Aged 9 or older
13/21 – Officially rated between 123-138
12/21 – Irish-bred winners
11/21 – Went onto finish unplaced in that season’s Grand National
11/21 – Returned a double-figure price in the betting
10/21 – Placed favourites
8/21 – Ran in the previous season’s Grand National
5/21 – Winning favourites
4/21 – Won last time out
3/21 – Trained by Paul Nicholls
3/21 – Irish-trained winners
3/21 – Trained by Nigel Twiston-Davies
1/21 – Went onto win the Grand National later in their career
0/21 – Went onto win the Grand National that same season
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After applying the trends above, I was left with the three horses below and have further analysed in the hope of identifying the winner:
Highland Hunter comes from a stable in form and a jockey in red-hot form and despite being ten has only had eight runs over fences winning twice and finishing second three times.
He has obviously had injury problems, but when sound he runs competitively. My only concern about him is being too high in the weights.
Ashtown Lad won this race last year off a slightly lower mark but had run well in his prep race. This time around he looked out of sorts in his prep and made several jumping errors before being pulled up when well beaten.
He will not win this race if he jumps like he did in that race, but perhaps the National fences will inspire Ashtown Lad into jumping like his usual self.
The stable has started to go well again, and he must have a chance if jumping well but his price at 5/1 is pretty skinny for a horse pulled up on his last two starts.
Chambard has one negative and that is he is French bred, but he generally jumps for fun and stays all day on all types of going.
Lucy Turner takes off a valuable five pounds and she is very impressive as a jockey and one that seems to have the ability to sit still when necessary and that helps her mount.
Lucy goes well on Chambard and has already clocked up four wins on him including the Kim Muir at the Cheltenham Festival.
Outside of the three listed above Coko Beach comes here in fine form having won the Troytown Chase in November and has experience of these fences, but probably carries too much weight.
Two at big odds that may go well are Moroder and Dorking Cock and at the lower end of the weights Percussion gets in off a nice weight but may not see out the trip.
The selection from a trends analysis perspective is Chambard, which is from the in form Venetia Williams stable and has the very able Lucy Turner aboard.
Chambard definitely stays and will cope with the going better than most.
His price allows us to play each-way so that is the suggestion and as always look out for extra places.
