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Well lads i hope your all wrong . Ive had 200 on the nose for denman , I did the same last year and he pissed it. Im hearing all this 8 pound higher mark buisness and i aint having it. Hes unstoppable at newbury so take the hint. So tell me a horse who can match him. The only danger i see is Weird al but will that horse stay and jump like denman.
Mr nicholls said their is a couple of more memorable days ahead of denman so that will do me.
Try Niche Market who ran well in this race last year, then had him beat in the Aon in February, before idling in front and caught by Tricky Trickster.
So surly on a featherweight and with the weather like it is must stand a very good chance of victory.
Can’t possibly think he has a chance of catching up with Denman, the latter having better form and never beaten by him (except for the one where McCoy fell off).
They first met at Kempton Park Denman carrying 11-10 and Niche Market carrying 11-6 and Niche Market finished 46 lengths adrift, both of them was in second and fourth respectively to easy winner Madison Du Berlais.
The second meeting was Newbury (Hennessy) Denman put in a winning display off 11-12 and Niche Market just 7.25 lengths in third off minimum 10 stone kept tabs on him.
The third and final meeting off level weight Niche was keeping tabs and looked to have the measure of Denman. Ordered to keep on his blind side, I think McCoy paniced when he knew that Niche Market was not going away. I think that if Denman hadn’t fallen when he did Niche would have won.
Big Fella Thanks: Talking horse that’s poorly handicapped and slow as a hearse. Immediately made me look to see if the shrewd trainer had anything else in it.
If he is that slow, how on earth did he win over 2m 4f at Newbury last March? The time certainly was not that bad considering he won doing handstands whilst idling when he went clear. His last outing at Carlisle would suggest he will come on for the run.
JohnJ
Big Fella Thanks: Talking horse that’s poorly handicapped and slow as a hearse. Immediately made me look to see if the shrewd trainer had anything else in it.
If he is that slow, how on earth did he win over 2m 4f at Newbury last March? The time certainly was not that bad considering he won doing handstands whilst idling when he went clear. His last outing at Carlisle would suggest he will come on for the run.
JohnJ
Hmmm. http://www.attheraces.com & look up BFT. Click on the dark blue "future form" bar next to that race, or merely hovver your mouse over it for the summary: 22 runs 0 wins, 2 placed, 20 unplaced; next time out 8 runs, 0 wins, 0 placed, 8 unplaced.
Then again, try the same over his race at Newbury in December – admittedly 1st time out.
His highest winning mark is 146 and he is effectively running off 156 in the Hennessy. Surely he has it all to do and anyway, one imagines that the last thing his owners will want is to screw up his mark for the National.
Actually, I feel sorry for the horse, because, like many rated 146 and over, there are precious few races in the calendar for them.
Pip pip!
I’ve backed Denman and Weird Al, however the prices of Pandorama and Burton Port look very tasty at 8s, may have to have some on the latter, that was my largest fund of Cheltenham, him to win the RSA.
Ssk,
Not doubting that he may be high in the handicap, however, I thought his run at Carlisle was most encouraging. Again, if I may ask the question, how is he as slow as a hearse?
JohnJ
Ssk,
Not doubting that he may be high in the handicap, however, I thought his run at Carlisle was most encouraging. Again, if I may ask the question, how is he as slow as a hearse?
JohnJ
Well it’s a figure of speech, of course. Obviously he’s not as slow as a maiden selling plater, and at the start of his chasing career he looked like an interesting prospect – and still may be in the kind of races where they go too quick and he is able to grind them down – perhaps one of the ‘nationals’ or even the big one. All too often in his career, however, either he has been outclassed or "outground".
Paul Nicholls has a reputation – fairly or otherwise – for being pretty unsentimental when it comes to getting rid of horses that he thinks he has got the best from. One cannot but imagine anything other than flying Nokias at Ditcheat if Denman is denied his hat trick of Hennessy GCs by Big Fella Thanks, the irony being, of course that they are in the same ownership!
As for his time in the March 6 race, it is very impressive. Slow by 1.66 seconds on good to soft. I did notice, however, that on the same card good old Eric’s Charm at the ripe old age of 12 over 3m 2 in the veterans race managed a time which was fast by 2.5 seconds!
It wasn’t a bad time, as it was the second best time recorded on the day. Nicholls did not get rid of BFT, he was removed by Harry Findley.
JohnJ
It wasn’t a bad time, as it was the second best time recorded on the day. Nicholls did not get rid of BFT, he was removed by Harry Findley.
JohnJ
Well John,
It was indeed the second fastest chase (or the second slowest), won in a time that would have put him a dozen lengths behind the winner of the veterans race
and
carrying nine lbs less.
You are probably right about Findlay, but seeing as the previous part-owner of BFT is Nicholls’ principal backer and business partner, it is hard not to surmise that if PN had really wanted to keep the horse, that’s where he would have stayed.
Anyway, you have company. http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,12427_6512705,00.html.
We all have our favourites, and I don’t dislike the horse in any way: he ran a blinder in the National until he ran out of gas. Probably his best race was his 3rd to Nacarat in the RP Chase. It’s just that I think he has been over-rated because of his connections. He is an 150 horse at best, pretty exposed and ought to be an interesting outsider
not
the same price as, for example, a horse like Carruthers, who dished out a 23 length beating to BFT at Newbury on the same terms as they will meet next week-end.
The fact is I’ve often had to eat my words about horses, and I don’t in the least mind doing so. If you think Big Fella Thanks will win the race, by all means go on and back him: the way the race is run may play to his strengths; Ferdy Murphy may have improved him; he might even sprout wings like Pegasus.
I still think he is a boat, carrying too much weight relative to horses with better credentials, and a skinny price.
Pip pip!
I notice most on this forum seem to be ‘old school’ comparing form and weights etc. Does this work? If you read twenty year old books by Mordin and Potts etc you get the impression weight didn’t matter much even back in the days before Betfair. Isn’t it more about statistical factors nowadays like horse age, trainer strike rates etc?
I notice most on this forum seem to be ‘old school’ comparing form and weights etc. Does this work? If you read twenty year old books by Mordin and Potts etc you get the impression weight didn’t matter much even back in the days before Betfair. Isn’t it more about statistical factors nowadays like horse age, trainer strike rates etc?
No Mclaren12 Horse weight is still the number 1 factor when assessing race horses thats why trainers run them down the handicap still,bit like they did 20yrs ago!
Maybe connections of BFT feel [as I do] that P Nicholls isn’t the right sort of trainer for staying chasers. Ferdy Murphy has said that he is the sort of horse that will probably become better over longer distances as he gets older..remember he was only 7 when he first tackled the Aintree fences. Don’t know much about his breeding; Primitive Rising out of Nunsdream.
Maybe connections of BFT feel [as I do] that P Nicholls isn’t the right sort of trainer for staying chasers. Ferdy Murphy has said that he is the sort of horse that will probably become better over longer distances as he gets older..remember he was only 7 when he first tackled the Aintree fences. Don’t know much about his breeding; Primitive Rising out of Nunsdream.
Blimey! Perhaps Paul Barber, Sir Alex F, Clive Smith, The Stewart Family, Jim Lewis etc. are all going to take their horses up North.
I notice most on this forum seem to be ‘old school’ comparing form and weights etc. Does this work? If you read twenty year old books by Mordin and Potts etc you get the impression weight didn’t matter much even back in the days before Betfair. Isn’t it more about statistical factors nowadays like horse age, trainer strike rates etc?
Mordin, did write about weight not being important as people thinks, but I think he later wrote that it does matter, only not on the scale traditional punters used.
Nick’s real point is if you want to win and make a profit in racing then you have to be different.
I notice most on this forum seem to be ‘old school’ comparing form and weights etc. Does this work? If you read twenty year old books by Mordin and Potts etc you get the impression weight didn’t matter much even back in the days before Betfair. Isn’t it more about statistical factors nowadays like horse age, trainer strike rates etc?
Mordin, did write about weight not being important as people thinks, but I think he later wrote that it does matter, only not on the scale traditional punters used.
Nick’s real point is if you want to win and make a profit in racing then you have to be different.
So as it stands, it’s a glorified conditions race with poor old Denman carrying a 26 lb penalty!
Mordin, did write about weight not being important as people thinks, but I think he later wrote that it does matter, only not on the scale traditional punters used.
Nick’s real point is if you want to win and make a profit in racing then you have to be different.
Weight does matter, but additional factors like a horses size and the sort of track a given animal will be asked to carry a big burden at come into play.
A good example of this and the going against the crowd thing that Potts and Mordin always banged on about was a November Handicap a few years back where it seemed everyone was backing Dato Star because it looked like the ground was going to be bottomless and said plunge allowed top weight Yavana’s Pace, a group class animal (who was this big strong horse ideally suited to weight carrying) to go off at an unbelievable 8/1. Good times.
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