The trainers who shine with three-year-old summer handicappers

When trainers make plans for their three-year-old handicappers, some have races restricted to the age group run at this time of year right at the top of their list of targets. Principally this is because many three-year-old handicaps run in Britain in July and August are less competitive compared to those run in other months of the turf season.

In the earlier months, many trainers want to avoid running immature three-year-olds against older horses and this is addressed by the race programme in Britain as May and June are the months when most three-year-old-only (3yo) handicaps take place.

This is reinforced by the figures in table 1 (below), which for each calendar month of the British Flat turf season, for Class 4 or lower Flat 3yo handicaps run between 2012 and 2016, shows how many of these races were run, the field-size averages and the percentage of races with five or fewer runners.