Watch & Learn: Timefigure analysis from Graeme North

There was more than enough good action from the Knavesmire last week to overfill this column but before analysing a good number of races from a timing perspective while highlighting a few lesser-known also-rans, I’ll see how things panned out for the yards I mentioned in my pre-Ebor overview.

The main takeaways from that piece were that the stables to focus on were those of William Haggas and John & Thady Gosden, who between them had averaged nearly four winners across each of the preceding ten Ebor festivals, while anything Owen Burrows and Michael Dods ran was also worth a look given their respective strike rates. And if there was one stable who might take the week by storm it wasn’t likely to be local heavyweights Charlie Johnston or Richard Fahey, but Ralph Beckett who went into York in red-hot form.

As it happened Beckett didn’t quite do that for all he saddled two winners from 12 runners, making it five winners at the meeting now in the last two seasons, but he did run riot at those meetings outside York in the same four days, saddling nine winners from 19 runners, three times as many as the next best trio of Haggas, Richard Hannon and David O’Meara managed.

Hannon didn’t feature on the scoresheet at York and O’Meara had to settle for a dead heat, but Haggas saddled three winners which meant he shared top spot with Aidan O’Brien’s whose trio came from a smaller string and included three seconds and two thirds as well.

The Gosdens had two winners and six seconds from 16 runners for a respectable week. Burrows and Dods were out of luck with their very small teams, but though Fahey got one on the board Johnston didn’t and one solitary third place from 19 runners extends a miserable record this year at the major festivals (Royal Ascot and Goodwood being the others) to zero winners and just six top-three finishes from 62 runners, truly a marketing headache with the yearling sale season just getting going.

Charlie Appleby also drew a blank at York, as he had at Ascot and Goodwood too, but from far fewer runners and, if nothing else, he won’t have to worry about the chequebook being brandished over the next few months.

Consistent ground credit to York team

The Sky Bet Ebor meeting opened on good to firm ground (and great credit to the Clerk of The Course William Derby for providing a consistent racing surface over all four days) with three Group races starting with the Tattersalls Acomb Stakes. Won by 2000 Guineas winner Chaldean last year, and previously by Irish 2000 winner Phoenix Of Spain, this year's renewal was run at a steady pace which resulted in the lowest winning timefigure (76) since subsequent Wokingham winner Big Timer scored in 2006.

I don’t doubt the latest winner Indian Run could drop back successfully to six furlongs as well, possessing too much of a turn of foot for the Richmond runner-up Ballymount Boy whose lack of tactical speed was exposed again, but even so a modest 9lb upgrade suggests the form could well be substandard.

The Sky Bet Great Voltigeur went not to Queen’s Vase winner Gregory as the market expected but Continuous who was getting off the mark for the season having been out the back in the French Derby either side of placed efforts in the Dante and the King Edward VII. No match for the much speedier King Of Steel at Ascot, Continuous looked much better served by this more strongly-run race and put himself in the St Leger picture with a 118 timefigure, upgraded to 120 after sectionals are taken into account.

Castle Way, who’d won a sprint-finish Bahrain Stakes at Newmarket, looked a non-stayer to me, paddling through the last furlong, but I wouldn’t be giving up on Gregory for the Leger. I’m not inclined to believe from the sectional data available (all courtesy of Course Track) that he went too fast and if he had he wouldn’t have rallied to run the last furlong just 0.18 seconds slower than Continuous having gone through the previous two furlongs 0.64 and 0.47 seconds slower as he hit a flat spot dropped back almost two and a half furlongs in distance.

The same happened to 2022 Queen’s Vase winner Eldar Eldarov, caught out by the drop to a mile and a half in the Grand Prix de Paris only to bounce back given more of a test of stamina at Doncaster.

With just four runners, the feature Juddmonte International was never likely to break the clock but a very well-judged ride from the front by Dettori saw Mostahdaf return a decent 121 timefigure which is pretty much on a par with that he recorded in the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes.

Nashwa ran to the same level (116) as in the Falmouth once more shaping (to me at least) as if she’s worth another try at a mile, outstayed and outrun by Mostahdaf in the final furlong having run each of the preceding three furlongs faster, while Paddington couldn’t repeat his 125 Eclipse timefigure, maybe not at his best on the day after a hard season but almost certainly not helped either by rail movements which took the official race distance to not far short of ten and a half furlongs, the latter comment applying equally to Nashwa as well.

Outside the feature events a couple of performances caught my eye. Saffie Osborne might argue that her options on Grappa Nonino were limited given his outside draw in the staying handicap, but the horse isn’t ridden so far back in Ireland and a bit more forward animation early on when the pace was steady wouldn’t have gone amiss.

As it was, he ended up running five of the last six furlongs fastest of all, something you rarely see in a horse that doesn’t even finish in the first five, before unsurprisingly emptying out close home.

Horse to follow from Wednesday nursery

Another worth keeping an eye on is Starlust who finished second to all-the-way winner Zoulu Chief in the concluding Sky Bet Nursery. On the face of things he’s run up to the level of his previous form, but given he ran each of the last four furlongs faster than the winner and two of the last four fastest of all it seemed to me more a case of what might have been. I’d wager this run took his form to a new level not obviously apparent from the bare race result.

Thursday kicked off with the Sky Bet Lowther in which Relief Rally proved a bit too savvy over the fast six furlongs for the better long-term prospect Cherry Blossom, but a 91 timefigure with no upgrade is a far cry from the 121 another Super Sprint winner Tiggy Wiggy recorded in the same race 2014 and the form looks unexceptional.

Half an hour later, fellow youngster Dragon Leader posted a 102 timefigure when blowing away his rivals in the Goffs Sales race. Not only did he post the joint second-fastest timefigure in the race in the last ten years but, unusually, ran both the fastest first furlong as well as the last. His previous Salisbury form is working out very well and that suggests both American Bay, who ran the last three furlongs faster than he did that day, and Nukanan, who ran the fastest last furlong despite getting behind after running green, look sure fire-next time out winners.

The Pertemps Network Yorkshire Oaks was run in the fastest time since the race was shortened officially in 2017 but was only the second time since then when there hasn’t been any additional yardage. Nearly two and a half seconds faster to the three-furlong pole than the following Galtres Stakes and yet only 0.11 seconds slower from that point, the race was a good test for all and saw Warm Heart and Free Wind, both back on faster ground, slug it out in 118 timefigures a couple of lengths ahead of Savethelastdance who had cut out the running.

As intimated, the closing sectionals don’t reflect particularly well on the bunched-finish Galtres, but they do for two other horses later in the card, Bigbertiebasset and Nigiri. Bigbertiebasset ran the last three furlongs only 0.05 slower than the winner and fastest last furlong in coming from too far back to finish ninth in the nursery, while the very progressive Nigiri ripped through the final furlong too fast for race commentator Stuart Machin to keep up with and was the only winner all day to dip under 12 seconds for the final furlong.

Where are we now with the stayers?

Friday’s Weatherbys Hamilton Lonsdale saw no repeat of Quickthorn being allowed to build up a long and easy lead as he had in the same race in 2022 so allowing Coltrane to extract his revenge on his old rival for defeats in 2022 and the recent Goodwood Cup as well as reverse Ascot Gold Cup form with Courage Mon Ami.

The last-named comes out best at the weights as well as sectionals but seemed to me to be too far back, running the fourth-last and third-last furlongs fastest of all but then finding that effort telling as Coltrane ran the faster fractions from then on.

Whatever, the story of the day came in the Nunthorpe where Live In The Dream won the Nunthorpe for his small stable on his first venture into Group One company.

The phrase ‘Horses For Courses’ is mostly used to describe course specialists but it applies just as widely to horses whose racing characteristics are exactly those required to excel at any particular track and York’s sprint course – and particularly its five furlongs – rewards all out speed from the front which Live In The Dream possesses in spades. Reinvented this year, if only slightly, as an out-and-out front runner, he was clear as usual after a furlong and though others ran faster in each of the following four furlongs it was never enough to reel him in.

Interestingly, defending champion Highfield Princess ran pretty much the same race she ran last year to within a length at each sectional point, and though she overhauled The Platinum Queen last year readily enough Live In The Dream (who wasn’t short headed until very late on in the Palace House at Newmarket on soft ground, remember) proved a far tougher nut to crack.

Three other horses since 2020 have won five-furlong handicaps off BHA marks of 100 or more as he did at Pontefract earlier in the season. One was Manaccan, third in the Palace House but now roughed off for the rest of the season, and another was subsequent Abbaye fourth and Temple third Lady In France. That suggests to me that the other of that quartet who has yet to reappear, recent Shergar Cup winner Rogue Lightning, shouldn’t be taken lightly if turning up in a Group race himself.

The Gimcrack was an up-to-scratch renewal in all likelihood, a 106 timefigure for the winner Lake Forest certainly suggesting as much.

Could Melrose winner be Leger colt?

That leaves the final day in which the biggest staying handicaps of the week, the Sky Bet Melrose and the Ebor, went to Middle Earth and Absurde in timefigures of 102 and 98 respectively.

The Melrose was run at the steadier pace for the first six furlongs, the leader reaching the mile pole almost exactly two seconds behind the leader in the Ebor, after which the pace picked up and the difference was whittled away steadily until the times for the leaders at the three-furlong pole weren’t dissimilar. Middle Earth ran each of the furlongs between four out and the furlong pole faster than his rivals, almost dipping below 11 seconds in one of them, much as he had at Newmarket in July when he ran each of the last five furlongs faster than subsequent ten-length Kempton winner Naqeeb, and that 102 timefigure can be upgraded to 107 after sectionals are incorporated.

Theoretically that leaves him with a bit to find yet to make his mark in Group One company given some have called him out as a possible St Leger winner, but Giavellotto, Dancing King and Believe In Love are all examples since 2020 of horses to have won in pattern company after scoring in a handicap over thirteen furlongs off a BHA mark of 93 or higher as a three-year-old so the potential is there.

Absurde came home four lengths slower from three out than Middle Earth, as well as slower than the three horses that followed him home (would have been four had Caius Chorister had any sort of luck in running) and was the beneficiary of a very well-judged ride - he also had the advantage of racing against the rail - in what promises to be muddling form.

Kinross, the first leg of a Dettori double on his last day riding at York and winning the Sky Bet City Of York Stakes for second year running, was another ride executed to perfection. A 116 timefigure is yet another in and around his best for this six-year-old whom Ralph Beckett has turned into the most consistent of performers.

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