Another Paisley Park, an amateur to follow and shoddy starts - surprising things we learned from the weekend's racing

Racing Post Analysts look beyond the headlines to pick out six developing trends, with a sprinkling of eye-catchers thrown in for good measure.

Another Paisley Park? This horse's next entry should tell us more

Emma Lavelle might be in her 28th season with a licence (I know, I couldn't believe it either), but she still had her best tally over jumps last term and repeated the trick on the Flat this year.

Lavelle has made a bright start to this season too and it will be interesting to see how the campaign unfolds for Ma Shantou, her well-backed winner of Saturday’s Pertemps qualifier.

He’s progressive and the temptation must be to kick on, but that would likely backfire with regard to his prospects for the final in March. Equally, there’s room for an improver at the top level of staying hurdlers too, especially for a yard that curated Paisley Park’s fabulous career.

This looks a classic case of stick or twist, and Ma Shantou’s next engagement should reveal which way the yard is thinking. However his thriving trainer plays her cards, you wouldn’t want to be the dealer.
Richard Russell

A new go-to amateur rider on the Flat

Amateur rider events are a niche part of horseracing, but that’s not to say there aren’t opportunities to be had. We can admit we've all backed Simon Walker blind in the past.

It’s becoming fairly obvious that Henry Callan will be a go-to rider for as long as he stays in these ranks. I must admit the strength of his record surprised me when I looked it up after watching him land the first at Newbury on Alpine Stroll on Saturday.

Henry Callan: a rider to watchCredit: John Grossick (racingpost.com/photos)

I used my copy of Raceform Interactive to see if there was an even better angle, and in true King Aftertimer style, I can tell you the young rider is 4-4 when riding over 1m4f or further, returning SPs of 4-6, 13-8, 8-1 and 9-1.

To me, that suggests his feel for race sectionals is already advanced. I imagine there is a world of difference between getting them right across two-and-a-half minutes and more in middle-distance races compared with point-and-shoot sprinters.
David Toft

Shoddy starts have not been resolved

Another big-field chase at Cheltenham, another ragged start. Friday’s amateur riders’ chase looked a goer the first time, only for the starter to refuse to let them go because the flag had yet to be raised (the option of swiftly lifting and dropping it seemingly unable to be used).

As the next few minutes played out, Ben Pauling’s Mole Court and Awaythelad were on the receiving end of a good kicking. Both were subsequently pulled up. The last-named ran not at all badly in the circumstances and is potential tracker material.

This is not to point a finger at the starter, far from it. He was simply following procedure and the 18 riders, who all received a one-day ban, must shoulder the blame.

Maybe those token suspensions need beefing up, to weigh a little heavier on the mind. Equally, starters could be afforded more flexibility to recognise a good one when they see it, and let them go. The subsequent report would still allow the stewards to give riders a skewering. One thing’s for sure, we still haven’t cracked the jump-start protocols and punters will continue to be on the sharp end.
Richard Russell

Aidan O'Brien is not the only impressive trainer of juveniles

A 1-2-3 and record-extending 12th win in the Futurity for Aidan O'Brien understandably garnered most of the headlines. The Ballydoyle maestro's depth in the staying two-year-old division this year is extraordinary, even by his own standards, but there were a couple of other training achievements at Doncaster worthy of mention.

The Listed success of Lam Yai, hot on the heels of a win for Leading Dancer in a similar race at Newbury, provided Karl Burke with his 61st juvenile winner of the season. That's the second time in the last three years he's topped 60 two-year-old winners for the campaign.

Karl Burke: was among the winners on day of the St Leger festival at Doncaster

Karl Burke: juveniles are on fireCredit: Edward Whitaker (racingpost.com/photos)

This year's total in Britain, achieved at an excellent 27 per cent strike-rate, includes two Group 2s, two Group 3s and four Listed events, a further sign of the ever-increasing quality in his Spigot Lodge ranks.

Stuart Williams sent out Crowd Quake to land an eighth handicap success of the year, with the latest gained off a mark 43lb higher than the first.

Generating sustained improvement from his charges is no one-off for Williams. Quinault plundered seven handicaps in 2023, including three valuable pots, while those with longer memories may recall Sendintank, who started 2004 as a 50-rated maiden and ended it with ten wins and a mark of 96.
Andrew Sheret

Changes to novice chase programme face uphill struggle

A field of 14 for a novice handicap chase to kick off ITV’s Saturday coverage? Surely that's a cause for celebration, and field sizes across Cheltenham's two days were generally healthy. Below the surface, however, the picture wasn’t quite as rosy.

Among a few changes announced by the BHA for this jumps season was a volte-face in the novice chase programme. Last season’s 70:30 split favoured handicaps ahead of weight-for-age in Class 1-3 races, flipping to a 70 per cent weighting toward non-handicaps, at least until the turn of the year.

On the face of it the rebranded ‘Chasing Excellence’ events at the Showcase meeting did okay, Friday’s two-miler and Saturday’s extended three-miler both garnering seven runners. Take out the Irish participation, however, and that collapses to a three-runner race and match respectively.

The race-planners’ aims are laudable, but the cat was long let out of the bag when the authorities allowed novice chasers to go straight into handicaps off their hurdle mark – a move that Ireland has resisted, incidentally. With two handicap chases for novices at the Cheltenham Festival, the tide is only further against them.

That said, Saturday's winner of the staying race, Leave Of Absence, reportedly could be set for the Coral Gold Cup next. Attracting horses with his profile in big handicaps is the sort of thing the British challenge needs.
Richard Russell

The maiden of doom? A curious trend from Newbury

Newbury had two divisions of a mile novice for fillies, and both winners looked above average. My Ophelia paid back a small part of her staggering 1,700,000gns price by landing the first in the faster time, while Ralph Beckett’s 550,000gns yearling purchase, A La Prochaine, looked good in beating a stablemate in the other.

My Ophelia, who is trained by William Haggas, is now just 20-1 for the Oaks, so there is little reason not to dream big now.

However, recent history tells us that landing that race is no guide to future success at a higher level. Last year's six-length winner has not been seen since finishing fourth in the Cheshire Oaks; Opera Forever never came close to that level or to winning in two starts after 2022; Queenlet went on to land a Musselburgh handicap as a three-year-old; and the 2021 winner Ching Shih never won again.

The three before that each won only once before retiring - one a handicap, the other two conditions events. Do ten-year trends allow for certain maidens acting like the Bermuda Triangle?
David Toft

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