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Hi there folks, another question from me re handicapping I’m afraid.
So often I see, when looking at the form of a very low-weighted runner, that the tipster says "will probably find this very tough from "out of the weights/out of the handicap"
How can having a feather-light weight on its back possibly be a disadvantage to a horse? In so many cases it obviously is not, and I have the money in my pocket to prove it!Another phrase that makes me laugh is "the handicapper has been kind". Kind?? The horse is still lugging 11st 12lbs on his back! Where’s the generosity there?
All European horses – flat or jumping – have official ratings which – with the exception of the Grand National – are used to weight horses in handicaps and to work out what sort of handicap race(conditions based on ratings) they can run in.
In the very old days horses could run off the weights the handicappers set them. However now all races have minimum weights – set so that the average jockey can do them without too much wasting.
Therefore if a horse is set to carry below the minimum weight they are said to be "out of the handicap" ie they have to carry more than the handicapper would like them to.
I’ll give you an unusual example on the flat at Meydan this Thursday. The top class sprinter J J The Jet Plane is rated 122 and set to carry 60k (9-7) in a handicap for horses rated 100+.
The usual English handicapper Barney McGrew is rated 100 and therefore should carry 50k. However the minimum weight in this race is 53k so if J J The Jet Plane runs he will be carrying 3 kilos (about 6 1/2 pounds) more than his rating. He may be carrying a "feather weight" but it shouldn’t be enough if both horses ran to their rating.
Similarly if a horse is given a lenient rating by the handicapper he may be carrying top weight in a modest contest but he could still be considered "well in" because his ability suggests he should be carrying even more.
Adrian sums it up pretty well nighthorse.
You can still use the Grand National as an example. The minimum weight to be carried in the National is 10st. When the handicap is set, the weights allotted go as far down as the handicapper sees fit. I may be wrong, but in the not too distant past, I think we have seen horses allotted 7st and below get into the race.
When they do race, those horses have to carry that minimum of 10st. So your 7st horse is running from "out of the weights" as he’s carrying more than the handicapper thinks he should do in order to be competitive. The 7st horse could also said to be ‘wrong at the weights’ – means the same thing.
It doesn’t happen so much in the National these days, as the handicapper has been given free rein to artificially compress the handicap to tempt a better quality of horse in. These days, there are far fewer horses in the national running from out of the handicap as there used to be.
Thank you Adrian and Old Applejack.
You both explained it very well and now I understand much better. I hope this will be the last time someone has to explain the basics to me about handicapping!
Hi there folks, another question from me re handicapping I’m afraid.
So often I see, when looking at the form of a very low-weighted runner, that the tipster says "will probably find this very tough from "out of the weights/out of the handicap".
You could see this as an implicit admission by said tipster that the effect of weight in itself is less than the effect of class – the classier horse carrying more weight, the horse with less class carrying less.
I think that’s born out by the higher-weighted horses winning more handicaps than the lower-weighteds.
Generally speaking.
With exceptions where the handicapper hasn’t yet caught up with the horse … or yet relented following some poor performances.Mr Chris was due to carry 6-10 in 1989. Doubt we’ll see that happen again.
You probably won’t. The Thinker, topweight that year, carried 11-10 and was rated 91. That’s the equivalent of 166 in the modern ratings system, which was introduced in time for the following jumps season (where 75 was added to the total).
If no compression of the ratings had occurred back then, and if there was indeed exactly five stone (70lb) worth of difference between The Thinker and Mr Chris at the time the weights came out, that would have made the latter worthy of a modern-day equivalent rating of 91 (which seems reasonable, given he’d coveted marks between 14 and 20 (89 to 95 in new money) in his outings before Aintree).
That leaves him comfortably short of the 110 minimum rating that was introduced for Grand National qualification in 1990, following Seeandem and Brown Trix’s demise in Mr Chris’s renewal.
Just for a 110-rated horse to be allotted 6-10 now, it would need something to be in the weights rated 180+ and for no compression to occur in regard of the higher-rated animal.
gc
Jeremy Grayson. Son of immigrant. Adoptive father of two. Metadata librarian. Freelance point-to-point / horse racing writer, analyst and commentator wonk. Loves music, buses, cats, the BBC Micro, ale. Advocate of CBT, PACE and therapeutic parenting. Aspergers.
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