Cheltenham Prep-Runs - The Track-By-Track Guide

The delicate fine-tuning in the weeks and months approaching the Cheltenham festival is unexplainably detailed and perfect; the daily work, the bits of training done on the gallops at home, and the ever-important final preparation run ahead of the festival.

Where and when to have this run is a question which will inevitably provoke disagreement, debate and differing opinions among spectators, pundits and connections. The variation in how you can choose to campaign a horse for Cheltenham is shown every year – Gold Cup favourite Silviniaco Conti will be having his first run since Boxing Day while Champion Chase favourite Sire De Grugy was brought back from injury to have to runs in quick succession in close proximity to the festival.

Leopardstown, Kempton and Cheltenham itself are just a few of the dozens of tracks offering ample opportunities for horses to warm up ahead of each race. Whether they have a simple run out in a class 2 or contest one of the most prestigious grade 1’s in the racing calendar, we always learn a lot about a horse’s claims in the build-up to the festival. But where is the best place for them to run?

We’re going to look at it from a statistical perspective to figure out where are the best and worst places to have your final run ahead of the Cheltenham festival. First, we look back over the last 10 years and pick out the best and worst tracks to have your final run before the festival.

R = Runners, W = Win, W% = Win%, P = Places (Excluding winners), W/P = Win+Places

Hot/Cold

So, the hot tracks – Uttoxeter is an interesting one as it’s not a common stop-off point for a horse on the way to Cheltenham and is better known as an alternative to Cheltenham, with its biggest race, the Midlands National, run the day after the Gold Cup. It’s closest meeting to the festival is held in early February. Despite the strong record, horses which had their last run at Newbury have been winless from 6 starts since 2009.

The other three “hot” tracks are all Irish – Punchestown, Leopardstown and Thurles. Punchestown is home of the Punchestown festival, structured very similarly to and widely regarded as the Irish version of the Cheltenham festival. Before Cheltenham, it hosts a decent juvenile hurdle, a decent novices hurdle, 2 mile chase, Grand National trial and Pertemps qualifier so there are plenty of opportunities for a horse to run there ahead of the festival.

Leopardstown however, is where the Irish runners are most likely to go before heading to Cheltenham. The flat track in South Dublin hosts almost all of the important Irish racing before the festival, with numerous fixtures throughout the winter and spring – the Irish Champion Hurdle is one of the main pieces of form ahead of the English equivalent at the festival, while Hennessy Gold Cup day hosts four Grade 1 races on the same card. The importance of Leopardstown has only grown in recent years – it has become the norm for at least 40 horses to run at the festival after a run at Leopardstown, for at least five horses to win at the festival after a run at Leopardstown, and for at least a third of them to make the frame. Not only this, but blindly backing runners which ran at Leopardstown last time out at the festival to a £/€1 stake would have yielded a profit of over £/€30 in each of the last 3 years!

Here’s a look at how horses which ran at Leopardstown last time out performed each year:

The other Irish track is another interesting one – Thurles hosts a couple of decent races in the months ahead of the festival (a grade 3 mares novice chase, the 2m 4f Brae Chase, a 2m 2f listed chase and the 2m 4f Michael Purcell novices hurdle). Thurles was a key track for prep runs from 2006-2009 (a winner at the festival in each of these years other than in 2008 when no horses had their festival prep run in Thurles) and again in 2013, when there was a winner and a placer from the 5 festival runners which had a run in Thurles last time out. Last year, there was one place from the four runners who ran at Thurles last time out. If you backed each horse than ran at Thurles last time out to a €/£1 stake for 10 years you would have a profit of €/£55.

Now, the “cold” tracks – Newcastle stands out as being absolutely shocking, with only 1 place from 33 runners at the festival. Generally these horses have been outsiders, but 1 place from 33 runners is a terrible record nonetheless. 

Following closely behind it in the worst records competition is Hereford – 2009 Grand Annual winner Oh Crick ran at Hereford on his way to the festival, but another 24 horses have tried taking the same route to Cheltenham in the last decade and all have failed.

Southwell has a similarly miserable record as a pre-festival prep run location with one winner and two places from 44 runners in the last 10 years while Huntingdon can claim a little more credit if not much, considering the fact that there have been no winners from 86 runners.

The races horses run in at the “cold” tracks listed are of a lower level than at the “hot” tracks which means that a lower class of horse runs and so their chances at the festival are always going to be lower up against tougher opposition. However, with terrible records, they’re definitely worth avoiding.

Most Common

That’s the most important bit, but we’ll include a few more things for further reference – on the left are the most common tracks for a horse to have their prep run ahead of the festival at and the success rates from each of these tracks in the last 10 years – as you can easily see, Leopardstown really stands out.

Less Common, More Successful

The hot and cold tracks were only compiled of tracks which at least 25 horses had had their prep runs at ahead of the Cheltenham festival in the last 10 years. This means that we could be missing out on some statistics which could be very interesting if not very reliable. Here are just two of the tracks which were more noticeable when we began to look at tracks with less than 25 runners.

Summary

The most important section by far was the hot and cold tracks, and we need to pay most attention to it. It tells us that Uttoxeter, Thurles and Punchestown and all very good tracks to have a prep run at ahead of the festival, but one stands out above the rest, and that's Leopardstown. We've also learned of the diabolical record of horses running after having a prep run at Newcastle, Hereford, Southwell or Huntingdon.

Mini-Angle

For those interested in finding angles and mini-systems for the festival, the table regarding Leopardstown will surely be of interest - the success of horses at the festival having run there last time out has grown each year and so have the profits, with over 30 points of profit when blindly backing these runners in each of the last 3 years.