Central to this article are concepts and language not frequently used elsewhere. They are explained in the opening paragraph and throughout but thought it useful to separate them at the beginning for ease of reference:
Spatial Image
The attempt here is to talk of a hierarchy of talent. In some cases this hierarchy is quite fixed and inflexible; in others it is much more fluid and interchangeable. In terms of talent we can talk of National Hunt horses in the following way:
Super-Elite
Elite
Elite with Exposed Limitations
[------a porous barrier------]
Lower Cluster (trying to rise through the barrier to challenge the Elite group)
Elite
A horse of confirmed/repeatable Graded class that is expected to challenge for Grade One races in open company.
Super-Elite
A horse of rare and extraordinary residual class whose presence effectively 'locks' the division. Current examples include Quevega, Sprinter Sacre and, until a season curtailed by a minor tendon injury, Big Buck's.
Elite with Exposed Limitations
A confirmed Elite horse whose curve of progression and ascent may have plateaued. 'Exposed' is not meant in a negative context but rather as signifying that we know a great deal about the horse and therefore any limits on their ability can be readily identified.
Porous Barrier
The symbolic dividing line between a good class horse and an Elite horse. The barrier in this model is two-way and the degree of porosity is in constant flux. If the elite group of horses is weak, the barrier becomes more porous, allowing greater movement through it. If the elite group is strong/deep, or if there is a super-elite horse in the division, the barrier is much more rigid, less porous, making movement through it much more difficult. In essence this just refers to the likelihood of a classy progressive horse rising through the ranks not just to join the elite, but to challenge for Grade One winner status.
Lower Cluster
The great wash of horses below elite level. Primarily for this model we are interested in novices with potential but even Festival winning novices remain below the barrier as they are yet to compete in open company. High class/progressive handicappers also feature here until being tested in elite company.
ONE of the hallmarks of a new National Hunt season is the opening array of wildly oscillating career paths assigned to horses broadly located in elite and non-elite strata. These predictions come from all sections of interest in racing: professional gamblers, leading media personnel, ratings analysts, recreational gamblers and so on; optimism is infectious. "Non-elite" simply refers to the great wash of equine promise and talent located below an elite level, be they a top novice, a high class handicapper or of a more moderate kind. "Elite" refers principally and in simple terms to open company Grade One winners and to strong, experienced Graded performers: essentially those select few horses found on several occasions battling for major Graded honours prior to and at the Cheltenham and Aintree festivals. Analytically, the first point to make is simply that all those horses designated as non-elite can be clustered together below a porous barrier above which resides the elite talent pool. Structurally, therefore, this spatial image of the organisation of National Hunt horses involves a distinction between high class horses moving upwards, attempting to break into the elite, and elite horses maintaining their status or struggling to do so, slipping downwards through the porous barrier into the main cluster. The second key point is that the greater the depth of elite talent the more rigid and less porous that barrier becomes, making it much more difficult for progressive non-elite horses to break into the races for major honours. Conversely, when the pool of elite talent is shallow, thinly spread across the distance divisions, so correspondingly the barrier becomes much more flexible, greater in porosity, signifying the greater chances of talent from the cluster rising into an elite position and the more vulnerable elite pool being dragged into a battle with them at a lower overall level in the structure.
The porous barrier in this spatial image is the site of the power struggle between top class and rising class talent that so often shapes discussions of the best races in the National Hunt calendar. We can go further. Elite group horses are stamped by the fact that in most cases we know the most about them. So much of that initial optimism and speculation crystallises around the younger horses from the lower cluster synonymous with the phrase 'could be anything' (among others) but it is clear that this is only possible because so little is known about them. There are often clues as to the underlying residual class of a younger horse (often misleading ones, too) but their physicality (stage of physical growth, maturity, robustness and the stages of these developments) is usually unknown by the trainer as is the specific mentality of the horse in question, which is typically an ongoing process in any case. This is essentially why many of the novice events at the Festival are best analysed deep into the season, when information on these crucial aspects is more fully developed and revealing. The elite group, operating in open company, are such a rich source analytically because of the extent to which they have revealed the very characteristics that are so well hidden in most younger horses. The ability to inspect increasingly detailed exposure of the strengths and weaknesses of top class horses makes it possible to assess the structural depth of them as a group across the distance divisions, or within one specific division.
In rare cases parts of the porous barrier become effectively sealed, closed off. This occurs in the presence of a horse belonging to the super-elite, providing there are no physical ailments. Occupants of this stratospheric band are blessed with such extraordinary ability that even elite horses are unable to cope with them. As is self-evident, there is therefore no chance of a progressive high-class horse with lower residual class than an elite horse posing a threat. The open company Grade One event in question at the Festival is therefore closed off. Current examples of the super-elite include Quevega (Mares Hurdle); Big Buck's (World Hurdle, see above); and Sprinter Sacre (Queen Mother Champion Chase).
There is a third sub-strata of the elite group. Adhering to our vertical spatial image, we have the "super-elite" beating the "elite", and the elite sparring with the "elite with exposed limitations". No doubt owing to the latter's position just above the porous barrier separating them from the lower cluster, it is around this tense area of rise and fall that most discussion centres. Not least because whereas for some people the details of the 'exposed limitations' will hinder a horse's chance, for others they will be the conditions which if improved upon can lead to an elite performance and success at the Cheltenham Festival. An example of this would be Sir Des Champs (Zarkandar running over two miles was another). After three Festival visits and a successful transition to chasing in open company he is an elite opponent that many would be willing to feature as their main bet for the Gold Cup in 2014. Others may wish to critique the merits of his Irish form and the relative ease with which Bobs Worth beat him in March - expressed as limitations the more we have gotten to know about him. Some will see further progression, others will see a plateau. As another example, Lord Windermere would be illustrative of a high class horse with elite pretensions who may, in time, be challenging the likes of Sir Des Champs for elite status. But as for Lord Windermere potentially challenging for honours in that division, the depth of the elite group is significant and therefore prohibitive to his chances of doing so: Bobs Worth, Al Ferof (also potentially), Silviniaco Conti, Long Run, Sir Des Champs and First Lieutenant form a formidable blocking pattern to any up and comers. To clarify this point, it is not that weight of numbers prevents a progressive high-class horse from making the transition upwards through the barrier into elite company, even challenging for glory. It is the fact that there are so many established horses for our hero to fight through, overcome, progress past, that it makes it highly unlikely that a horse could have the requisite residual class to do so; there is a self-regulating limit on the possible number of elite horses in any one division at any one time. If such a horse did have such talent, it would become obvious very quickly. Remaining finally with the example of Lord Windermere, his RSA Chase win was full of merit and visually quite taking (to mention these most basic points) but it is not obvious from his novice season that a major role in such a tough elite crowd will be forthcoming. This leads us to an analytical signpost that has major implications for understanding the structural depth of the forthcoming season and therefore any betting approach seeking to incorporate the big races at the Cheltenham Festival: namely, the problem of individuality.
Whilst mention has been made of specific horses as a means of illustrating different strata in the National Hunt season's structural model, it is important to stress that detailed discussion of individual horses winning a specific race is irrelevant for an understanding of the structural model itself. When assessing the likely outcome of a specific race some of the biggest analytical mistakes arise from focusing almost exclusively on the merits of an individual horse and his or her opponents as individuals without reference to the place of those merits in the power struggle of the strata involved. One of the best examples of this (given that it is error-strewn) can be found here, on this blog, in the shape of the 2012 Hennessy Gold Cup, won emphatically by Bobs Worth. The way in which I sometimes formulated thoughts then was simply unacceptable and this was the race that made me transition to an unswervingly analytical approach (as seen from the 2012 King George onwards). For this example I will need to break into first person prose.
Roughly speaking, the weekend and early part of the week before the Hennessy was due to be run saw heavy downpours and forecasts of soft ground at Newbury, potentially heavy ground if bad weather continued into the latter part of the week. I began assessing the race on an individual basis (which is fine) but without any context of what strata were represented and to what depth or extent (which is not). For reasons of work I would need to make my assessments and selections by Thursday (another mistake) and from memory I think I made them by the Wednesday (I was clearly rushing a bit). Whilst technically poor, my error-strewn approach to this contest, propelled by a need to reach a decision quite early, nonetheless helps to vividly highlight the overall point (even though the race is a top-end handicap, not an open company Grade One). This is because the race eventually featured what could be termed a 'potentially elite group' of three runners (Bobs Worth, First Lieutenant [the RSA 1-2] and Tidal Bay [had Graded form and won the Whitbread off 154]; and below them a cluster of honest but largely exposed handicap level horses. The question was how porous was the barrier? I never came close to ascertaining the strata representations nor the spatial image of the barrier between them. The race panned out in precisely that way, however, with the three 'potentially elite horses' filling the first three places comfortably ahead of the lower cluster. The barrier had been quite rigid, with low porosity; the higher group were unchallenged. What had I done? In one line: Bobs Worth's participation had been in doubt due to the bad weather; First Lieutenant had developed some 'exposed limitations' through his novice season (and would go ten races in total without a victory); and Tidal Bay was an enigmatic older horse running off 166. Without a structural depth model in my head, I proceeded to look for a lighter weighted cluster horse that would relish a stamina test on bad ground, and found two. The ground then dried out appreciably, thus confirming Bobs Worth's participation. My selections ran quite well (finishing 5th and 7th) but nothing can hide the glaring conceptual misunderstanding of a high-end race that this approach illustrated. In truth I had not even developed the concepts then to which I am referring now but this also goes to highlight just how easy it can be to misjudge what is really happening: to not even think or remind oneself to be aware of the dynamics of elite vs lower level talent, when what we are trying to identify is the best horse (most residual class) in the race is not an acceptable method. What presented itself during this race was a fair illustration of the model being discussed here. What will help to explain it further is applying the spatial image of structural depth to one of the Grade One races of the Cheltenham Festival this season: the Gold Cup.
Any horse can lead us into the spatial image and Al Ferof will suffice. Priced at 20/1 by some firms, and not priced at all by others, in our model Al Ferof resides at the high end of the lower cluster, looking up at the elite. Any challenge for Gold Cup honours depends on both his individual progression (revealing his true level of residual class) and the depth of elite talent he must compete with and surpass. This race, this season, stretches the vertical aspect of the model perhaps more than any other of the Grade Ones in the calendar. Whether Bobs Worth is representative of a super-elite layer is open to debate (owing to only two, albeit imperious, performances in open company) but either way he is by some way the strongest of the elite opponents, stretching upwards towards Festival infamy. He has comprehensively beaten three of his elite rivals in First Lieutenant, Sir Des Champs and Long Run. That statement alone immediately firms up and begins to block off the barrier between the elite and the lower cluster when one considers just what those three horses have achieved between them in Graded company. Silviniaco Conti may well have been a fourth vanquished elite opponent, how closely so we cannot gauge until both re-oppose in March. Collectively, this group constitute an elite strata of almost unheralded depth and power. Dynaste's position among them is uncertain: he may sit just above or just below the barrier, depending on one's own view; but that there are scenarios where he features quite prominently in King George calculations underlines still further what stands above him (he may be targeted at the Ryanair Chase as a result). Of anything currently residing below the barrier, therefore, there is little to no room for anything other than outstanding performance and progression from the moment their season begins. Al Ferof is conceptually interesting. He stands in the 'potentially elite' area of the lower cluster owing to a tendon injury sustained a week before the King George, for which he was around 5/1, a race that may have begun to confer elite status upon him. When we consider the earlier sentence - "there is little to no room for anything other than outstanding performance and progression from the moment their season begins" - Al Ferof, physical soundness permitting, has the potential to meet that criteria. Others may or may not; individual choice and assessment is just that. The fact that Al Ferof alone of those from the lower cluster is being aimed quite specifically at a King George assault is likely significant in this regard.
In other divisions or at other distances, the vertical axis will be much more compressed. The elite strata packed tighter; the barrier will have greater porosity; the movement through it from the lower cluster will be more attainable, more significant. And all of this is in constant flux. Injuries, physical problems, weather, the whole concatenation of variables that impact a horse's season are in play, creating stronger tensions around the barrier here, weaker ones there. It is this stretching and compressing of the structural depth that helps to determine what kind of horse will battle for champion status because, with near total certainty, only two or three per division can do so. The application of the structural depth model to specific divisions is the task of Part Two, but simple research reveals that the vast majority of the winners of the King George VI Chase and the open company Grade One's at the Cheltenham Festival were readily identifiable in the close season prior to their wins in those races. Of those that, during the prior close season were not as obvious, nearly all had come into sharper focus by the end of the calendar year. The National Hunt season at elite level has a structural regularity that is very rarely explained or explored. Part Two to follow.
Spatial Image
The attempt here is to talk of a hierarchy of talent. In some cases this hierarchy is quite fixed and inflexible; in others it is much more fluid and interchangeable. In terms of talent we can talk of National Hunt horses in the following way:
Super-Elite
Elite
Elite with Exposed Limitations
[------a porous barrier------]
Lower Cluster (trying to rise through the barrier to challenge the Elite group)
Elite
A horse of confirmed/repeatable Graded class that is expected to challenge for Grade One races in open company.
Super-Elite
A horse of rare and extraordinary residual class whose presence effectively 'locks' the division. Current examples include Quevega, Sprinter Sacre and, until a season curtailed by a minor tendon injury, Big Buck's.
Elite with Exposed Limitations
A confirmed Elite horse whose curve of progression and ascent may have plateaued. 'Exposed' is not meant in a negative context but rather as signifying that we know a great deal about the horse and therefore any limits on their ability can be readily identified.
Porous Barrier
The symbolic dividing line between a good class horse and an Elite horse. The barrier in this model is two-way and the degree of porosity is in constant flux. If the elite group of horses is weak, the barrier becomes more porous, allowing greater movement through it. If the elite group is strong/deep, or if there is a super-elite horse in the division, the barrier is much more rigid, less porous, making movement through it much more difficult. In essence this just refers to the likelihood of a classy progressive horse rising through the ranks not just to join the elite, but to challenge for Grade One winner status.
Lower Cluster
The great wash of horses below elite level. Primarily for this model we are interested in novices with potential but even Festival winning novices remain below the barrier as they are yet to compete in open company. High class/progressive handicappers also feature here until being tested in elite company.
ONE of the hallmarks of a new National Hunt season is the opening array of wildly oscillating career paths assigned to horses broadly located in elite and non-elite strata. These predictions come from all sections of interest in racing: professional gamblers, leading media personnel, ratings analysts, recreational gamblers and so on; optimism is infectious. "Non-elite" simply refers to the great wash of equine promise and talent located below an elite level, be they a top novice, a high class handicapper or of a more moderate kind. "Elite" refers principally and in simple terms to open company Grade One winners and to strong, experienced Graded performers: essentially those select few horses found on several occasions battling for major Graded honours prior to and at the Cheltenham and Aintree festivals. Analytically, the first point to make is simply that all those horses designated as non-elite can be clustered together below a porous barrier above which resides the elite talent pool. Structurally, therefore, this spatial image of the organisation of National Hunt horses involves a distinction between high class horses moving upwards, attempting to break into the elite, and elite horses maintaining their status or struggling to do so, slipping downwards through the porous barrier into the main cluster. The second key point is that the greater the depth of elite talent the more rigid and less porous that barrier becomes, making it much more difficult for progressive non-elite horses to break into the races for major honours. Conversely, when the pool of elite talent is shallow, thinly spread across the distance divisions, so correspondingly the barrier becomes much more flexible, greater in porosity, signifying the greater chances of talent from the cluster rising into an elite position and the more vulnerable elite pool being dragged into a battle with them at a lower overall level in the structure.
The porous barrier in this spatial image is the site of the power struggle between top class and rising class talent that so often shapes discussions of the best races in the National Hunt calendar. We can go further. Elite group horses are stamped by the fact that in most cases we know the most about them. So much of that initial optimism and speculation crystallises around the younger horses from the lower cluster synonymous with the phrase 'could be anything' (among others) but it is clear that this is only possible because so little is known about them. There are often clues as to the underlying residual class of a younger horse (often misleading ones, too) but their physicality (stage of physical growth, maturity, robustness and the stages of these developments) is usually unknown by the trainer as is the specific mentality of the horse in question, which is typically an ongoing process in any case. This is essentially why many of the novice events at the Festival are best analysed deep into the season, when information on these crucial aspects is more fully developed and revealing. The elite group, operating in open company, are such a rich source analytically because of the extent to which they have revealed the very characteristics that are so well hidden in most younger horses. The ability to inspect increasingly detailed exposure of the strengths and weaknesses of top class horses makes it possible to assess the structural depth of them as a group across the distance divisions, or within one specific division.
In rare cases parts of the porous barrier become effectively sealed, closed off. This occurs in the presence of a horse belonging to the super-elite, providing there are no physical ailments. Occupants of this stratospheric band are blessed with such extraordinary ability that even elite horses are unable to cope with them. As is self-evident, there is therefore no chance of a progressive high-class horse with lower residual class than an elite horse posing a threat. The open company Grade One event in question at the Festival is therefore closed off. Current examples of the super-elite include Quevega (Mares Hurdle); Big Buck's (World Hurdle, see above); and Sprinter Sacre (Queen Mother Champion Chase).
There is a third sub-strata of the elite group. Adhering to our vertical spatial image, we have the "super-elite" beating the "elite", and the elite sparring with the "elite with exposed limitations". No doubt owing to the latter's position just above the porous barrier separating them from the lower cluster, it is around this tense area of rise and fall that most discussion centres. Not least because whereas for some people the details of the 'exposed limitations' will hinder a horse's chance, for others they will be the conditions which if improved upon can lead to an elite performance and success at the Cheltenham Festival. An example of this would be Sir Des Champs (Zarkandar running over two miles was another). After three Festival visits and a successful transition to chasing in open company he is an elite opponent that many would be willing to feature as their main bet for the Gold Cup in 2014. Others may wish to critique the merits of his Irish form and the relative ease with which Bobs Worth beat him in March - expressed as limitations the more we have gotten to know about him. Some will see further progression, others will see a plateau. As another example, Lord Windermere would be illustrative of a high class horse with elite pretensions who may, in time, be challenging the likes of Sir Des Champs for elite status. But as for Lord Windermere potentially challenging for honours in that division, the depth of the elite group is significant and therefore prohibitive to his chances of doing so: Bobs Worth, Al Ferof (also potentially), Silviniaco Conti, Long Run, Sir Des Champs and First Lieutenant form a formidable blocking pattern to any up and comers. To clarify this point, it is not that weight of numbers prevents a progressive high-class horse from making the transition upwards through the barrier into elite company, even challenging for glory. It is the fact that there are so many established horses for our hero to fight through, overcome, progress past, that it makes it highly unlikely that a horse could have the requisite residual class to do so; there is a self-regulating limit on the possible number of elite horses in any one division at any one time. If such a horse did have such talent, it would become obvious very quickly. Remaining finally with the example of Lord Windermere, his RSA Chase win was full of merit and visually quite taking (to mention these most basic points) but it is not obvious from his novice season that a major role in such a tough elite crowd will be forthcoming. This leads us to an analytical signpost that has major implications for understanding the structural depth of the forthcoming season and therefore any betting approach seeking to incorporate the big races at the Cheltenham Festival: namely, the problem of individuality.
Whilst mention has been made of specific horses as a means of illustrating different strata in the National Hunt season's structural model, it is important to stress that detailed discussion of individual horses winning a specific race is irrelevant for an understanding of the structural model itself. When assessing the likely outcome of a specific race some of the biggest analytical mistakes arise from focusing almost exclusively on the merits of an individual horse and his or her opponents as individuals without reference to the place of those merits in the power struggle of the strata involved. One of the best examples of this (given that it is error-strewn) can be found here, on this blog, in the shape of the 2012 Hennessy Gold Cup, won emphatically by Bobs Worth. The way in which I sometimes formulated thoughts then was simply unacceptable and this was the race that made me transition to an unswervingly analytical approach (as seen from the 2012 King George onwards). For this example I will need to break into first person prose.
Roughly speaking, the weekend and early part of the week before the Hennessy was due to be run saw heavy downpours and forecasts of soft ground at Newbury, potentially heavy ground if bad weather continued into the latter part of the week. I began assessing the race on an individual basis (which is fine) but without any context of what strata were represented and to what depth or extent (which is not). For reasons of work I would need to make my assessments and selections by Thursday (another mistake) and from memory I think I made them by the Wednesday (I was clearly rushing a bit). Whilst technically poor, my error-strewn approach to this contest, propelled by a need to reach a decision quite early, nonetheless helps to vividly highlight the overall point (even though the race is a top-end handicap, not an open company Grade One). This is because the race eventually featured what could be termed a 'potentially elite group' of three runners (Bobs Worth, First Lieutenant [the RSA 1-2] and Tidal Bay [had Graded form and won the Whitbread off 154]; and below them a cluster of honest but largely exposed handicap level horses. The question was how porous was the barrier? I never came close to ascertaining the strata representations nor the spatial image of the barrier between them. The race panned out in precisely that way, however, with the three 'potentially elite horses' filling the first three places comfortably ahead of the lower cluster. The barrier had been quite rigid, with low porosity; the higher group were unchallenged. What had I done? In one line: Bobs Worth's participation had been in doubt due to the bad weather; First Lieutenant had developed some 'exposed limitations' through his novice season (and would go ten races in total without a victory); and Tidal Bay was an enigmatic older horse running off 166. Without a structural depth model in my head, I proceeded to look for a lighter weighted cluster horse that would relish a stamina test on bad ground, and found two. The ground then dried out appreciably, thus confirming Bobs Worth's participation. My selections ran quite well (finishing 5th and 7th) but nothing can hide the glaring conceptual misunderstanding of a high-end race that this approach illustrated. In truth I had not even developed the concepts then to which I am referring now but this also goes to highlight just how easy it can be to misjudge what is really happening: to not even think or remind oneself to be aware of the dynamics of elite vs lower level talent, when what we are trying to identify is the best horse (most residual class) in the race is not an acceptable method. What presented itself during this race was a fair illustration of the model being discussed here. What will help to explain it further is applying the spatial image of structural depth to one of the Grade One races of the Cheltenham Festival this season: the Gold Cup.
Any horse can lead us into the spatial image and Al Ferof will suffice. Priced at 20/1 by some firms, and not priced at all by others, in our model Al Ferof resides at the high end of the lower cluster, looking up at the elite. Any challenge for Gold Cup honours depends on both his individual progression (revealing his true level of residual class) and the depth of elite talent he must compete with and surpass. This race, this season, stretches the vertical aspect of the model perhaps more than any other of the Grade Ones in the calendar. Whether Bobs Worth is representative of a super-elite layer is open to debate (owing to only two, albeit imperious, performances in open company) but either way he is by some way the strongest of the elite opponents, stretching upwards towards Festival infamy. He has comprehensively beaten three of his elite rivals in First Lieutenant, Sir Des Champs and Long Run. That statement alone immediately firms up and begins to block off the barrier between the elite and the lower cluster when one considers just what those three horses have achieved between them in Graded company. Silviniaco Conti may well have been a fourth vanquished elite opponent, how closely so we cannot gauge until both re-oppose in March. Collectively, this group constitute an elite strata of almost unheralded depth and power. Dynaste's position among them is uncertain: he may sit just above or just below the barrier, depending on one's own view; but that there are scenarios where he features quite prominently in King George calculations underlines still further what stands above him (he may be targeted at the Ryanair Chase as a result). Of anything currently residing below the barrier, therefore, there is little to no room for anything other than outstanding performance and progression from the moment their season begins. Al Ferof is conceptually interesting. He stands in the 'potentially elite' area of the lower cluster owing to a tendon injury sustained a week before the King George, for which he was around 5/1, a race that may have begun to confer elite status upon him. When we consider the earlier sentence - "there is little to no room for anything other than outstanding performance and progression from the moment their season begins" - Al Ferof, physical soundness permitting, has the potential to meet that criteria. Others may or may not; individual choice and assessment is just that. The fact that Al Ferof alone of those from the lower cluster is being aimed quite specifically at a King George assault is likely significant in this regard.
In other divisions or at other distances, the vertical axis will be much more compressed. The elite strata packed tighter; the barrier will have greater porosity; the movement through it from the lower cluster will be more attainable, more significant. And all of this is in constant flux. Injuries, physical problems, weather, the whole concatenation of variables that impact a horse's season are in play, creating stronger tensions around the barrier here, weaker ones there. It is this stretching and compressing of the structural depth that helps to determine what kind of horse will battle for champion status because, with near total certainty, only two or three per division can do so. The application of the structural depth model to specific divisions is the task of Part Two, but simple research reveals that the vast majority of the winners of the King George VI Chase and the open company Grade One's at the Cheltenham Festival were readily identifiable in the close season prior to their wins in those races. Of those that, during the prior close season were not as obvious, nearly all had come into sharper focus by the end of the calendar year. The National Hunt season at elite level has a structural regularity that is very rarely explained or explored. Part Two to follow.
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