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The 3.10 Beverley once again saw low numbers swoop home to finish first and second
For those of you who missed the BHA Q+A thread – any suggestion that selective watering has taken place at Beverley in an attempt to negate the traditional high-draw bias has been refuted by the BHA….
I wonder – has anyone at the BHA got any explanation as to why the low numbers seem to doing much better this season?
We know that Clerk of the course , Sally Iggulden, went on record a few years ago saying she wanted to negate the traditional bias . It looks like she has succeeded, but the question is – how??
One race proves very little. Draw 14 beat draw 8 in the first, a nursery handicap with 17 declared reduced to 14.
It could be inferred that you believe low draws winning over 5f at Beverley shouldn’t be allowed to happen.
Rob
Agreed – one race proves nothing – but this has been going on for a while Rob.
I’m not making any judgement about which draws should or shouldn’t be advantaged, I’m merely in interested in how the apparent change in draw bias has been achieved by the track.
It isn’t selective watering (apparently), so what is it?
But my point is that if you went by the result of the first race you would come to the conclusion that high numbers were favoured.
By the same token if the winning post for the 3.10 had been 10 strides earlier then draw 13 would have beaten draw 9 with 2 and 5 occupying 5th and 6th (approximately). A glance at that result then would have suggested that high numbers were favoured! The last three to finish were drawn 15, 14 and 17, but then they’ve shown diddly-squat in recent runs anyway. A case of race pace having more influence than the draw?
Rob
Spearman rank correlations (x=placing, y=draw) for the two races:
0.05 for the first race
0.47 for the 3.10 (statistically significant)Low numbers seemed to be favoured today. Don’t hold your breath waiting for an explanation as to why.
I don’t know and I don’t know any bookies that pay out on such a finishing order.
Not entirely sure how relevant it is in any case, when we’re discussing the relatively new phenomena of horses finishing fast and late down the centre of the track, while those on the far rail appear to be in a slow lane.
Indeed – it was the same in the Beverley Bullet – Noble Storm looked all over the winner 1f out (from a high draw) but was mugged by the low drawn finishers down the centre of the track. It certainly seems to be in the closing stages where the high drawn runners falter.
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It would be good if the Beverley executive, or the BHA, could explain how this phenomenon has arisen without selective watering?
Truth be told, short of ripping up the 5f course and re-aligning it, there appears no other logical way of changing the bias so markedly.Here is the answer I got wrt Beverley from Paul Struthers:
Beverley state that they never carry out selective watering. It would be nigh-on impossible to selectively water the home straight, as it is narrow for its entire length. Four years ago Beverley invested in a new Briggs boom irrigator and this is used on the home straight rather than the old tow-line system, which definitely gives a more uniform coverage, especially if it is breezy during watering (which it inevitably is at Beverley). Additionally, they have worked hard to stop dog walkers hogging the inside line year round, and in the winter we put effective barriers in place which do deter walkers from sticking to the rail, and hence ease compaction in this area.
The chronology of the new watering system doesn’t seem to match the weakening of the bias, which leaves the dog walkers. This might explain the home straight phenomena but it doesn’t explain low draws starting like a bullet on the occasions the psychics have smashed into them (eg 4th July 2008, 12th Aug 2009).
I can think of two other tracks where the arrival of a new watering system has had an effect on a previous draw bias.
One was the old Kempton staright 6F track – high numbers used to have a massive edge when the stalls were on the far side in the 80’s, but that bias diminshed through the 90’s.
The other is Goodwood, where the boom system arrived early in this decade, and that reduced the bias for runners on the far rail. They still have an edge, but it’s nothing like it was in the late 90’s when front runners on the rail would have been the ultimate in-running system. I’ve still got a VHS tape of races from Goodwood run in 97 – 99, with winner after winner in front three out and holding off all comers despite looking beaten.
Not saying the boom fully explains events at Beverley, but I can believe it does have some effect.
AP
I hadn’t realised they were now using a boom at Beverley. Use of a boom changed things at Hamilton where there always used to be a high draw bias but there’s very little in the draw these days.
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I can think of two other tracks where the arrival of a new watering system has had an effect on a previous draw bias.
One was the old Kempton staright 6F track – high numbers used to have a massive edge when the stalls were on the far side in the 80’s, but that bias diminshed through the 90’s.
The other is Goodwood, where the boom system arrived early in this decade, and that reduced the bias for runners on the far rail. They still have an edge, but it’s nothing like it was in the late 90’s when front runners on the rail would have been the ultimate in-running system. I’ve still got a VHS tape of races from Goodwood run in 97 – 99, with winner after winner in front three out and holding off all comers despite looking beaten.
Not saying the boom fully explains events at Beverley, but I can believe it does have some effect.
AP
AP
As I recall, all 3 courses had/have a right-hand ‘kink’, which provides a natural bias to horses drawn high, and would have to be selectively watered to negate this?
However, Beverley’s ‘kink’ is so severe that it’s difficult to believe either dog walkers or boom watering could make such a difference.
Despite the BHA’s assertion to the contrary, I also distinctly recall Beverley using selective watering of the 5f course as a matter of policy only a few seasons ago, so it’s not hard to believe it’s again responsible for the current remarkable turnaround in the bias.
Maybe they should get a boom-watering sysyem for Chester?
Worth pointing out that the distances between first and seventh in that sprint handicap at Beverley were as follows: nose, hd, sh hd, sh hd, hd, sh hd. I’d have thought it’s the kind of finish we want to see in handicaps, rather than the farcical bias we saw at that track years ago, when horses drawn in low stalls were often tailed off with two furlongs to run. The high numbers are not inconvenienced to my eye, although some are the victims of scrimmaging as the field moves to the rail. If it’s selective watering, then the man behind it is a genius for evening things up so well.
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No problem at all with that Rory, in the hands of people you’d trust to let us know.
Can’t argue with your comments Rory – I would enjoy Beverley more if there wasn’t a pronounced bias.
The nightmare situation, however, is one whereby they selectively water from time to time, without informing the betting public as to what they are up to (a la Folkestone earlier in this season).
I think we all just want some transparency regarding what the course are up to.
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