It Worked In The 80's? - #2 Hat-Trick Seekers - with Andrew Mount

This week’s blast from the systems past is a “Systems Study by Formulator” article titled “Sifting through the hat-trick seekers”. There’s no date on the newspaper cutting that Simon sent me but the reverse side shows the football fixtures for the FA Cup first round and a quick Google search puts the date at mid-November 1984. I wonder who won out of Met Police and Dartford?

The article begins with a simple question posed by Mr L Jones of Swansea “How well do horses which have won their last two races perform on their next outing?”

Formulator tries to answer the question by looking at qualifiers from the previous jumps season before discussing such angles as going, course, jockeys, weight, trainers, course and distance winners and franking of the form. He goes on to explain “the 200 random survey results of horses winning two races on the trot showed that 34.5% won their third race compared to a general winning average over the sticks for previous winners of 25%.”

My Proform database contains results from 1997 so I can’t go back to the 80s but I’ve looked at what’s happened to hat-trick seekers in hurdle/chases in Britain/Ireland in the past 12 months…

…the strike-rate is only 23.89% (227 winners from 950 bets) but that is almost identical to what the market expected (EX wins = 228.07). Backing all the qualifiers would have returned a loss of £91.62 to a £1 level stake at SP (-9.64% on turnover) but that loss becomes a profit of £52.69 (+5.55%) at Betfair SP after 2% commission.

Splitting the qualifiers by race class makes interesting reading…

…with an SP profit in Class 1 and Class 5 level.

There was little difference in expected winners between hurdlers and chasers, but the chasers showed a profit at SP…

Those stepping up in class by at least one grade returned a loss at both SP and Betfair SP…

Those running in handicap company made a good profit at Betfair SP…

Had we only backed the handicap chasers who were running in the same class as for their latest win we’d have found 30 winners from 130 bets and made a profit of £41.63 at SP (+£84.66 at BSP after comm)…

…the bulk of the profits were down to the most recent qualifier, 33-1 Grand National winner Nick Rockett.

There are two qualifiers on this system running today (April 15) and two more tomorrow…

…if Mr L Jones of Swansea is still with us and enjoying a punt, he might want to play up his Grand National winnings with a Yankee on the four horses listed above.

Andrew Mount 

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