Bellewstown July Festival: Essential profit pointers

005 Irish Racing / Wayne Bailey / 03 July 2008 / Leave a Comment

Our man across the Irish Sea has all you need to know (and stuff you don't need to know!) about the annual summer festival where Willie Mullins (pictured) is among the leading trainers...

For the Irish, Bellewstown will always be associated with Barney Curley and the infamous Yellow Sam gambling coup of 1975. Recognised as one of the smartest strokes in decades, the course even ran a race to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the scam in 2005.

Sadly (arguably!), such exploits are a definitely a thing of the past, and as much as I'd love to be a modern day Robin Hood, the only way of making a few quid from Bellewstown in 2008 is by getting the form books out. Mind you, that's proving to be an interesting exercise, and there's plenty of pointers that I'm hoping will help earn me a few quid during the three-day mixed meeting:

(All data is from 2003 onwards)

Festival Favourites

Following the jolly blindly is not usually a good strategy, but it's nice to know how well or poorly the favourite performs at a course, and can give us a level of confidence in our betting.

The Bellewstown festival is a mix of Jumps and Flat, and the favourite win-rate varies greatly between the two codes.

On the Jumps, the favourite wins one race in five on average, and shows a big loss to level stakes. The Flat favourites however, show a win-rate of one in three and show a small profit if blindly backed.

The Trainers

The trainer stats are not comprehensive by any means, and the data involved only provides a small sample. However, Ger Lyons regularly performs well at the Festival and rarely has a year without having at least a couple of winners. Willie Mullins shows a good win and profit rate for the backer, so his entries will also be worth noting.

The Jockeys

Sticking with Ruby Walsh won't see you too far wrong and the Irish champ shows a profit here if blindly backed. Another man who knows his way around Bellewstown is Fran Berry, who has a 23% strike rate and also shows a profit to level stakes.

The Races

It's fair to say that the quality of racing would not be at the top end of the scale, but there's very much a mixed bag on offer on both Flat and also over hurdles. With five wins from seven races, the bumpers have become the 'Willie Mullins Show' in recent years. His two for this year, namely Watchurhouse and Slave Hill simply must be backed on Thursday's two respective bumpers.

The track itself is quite sharp, and has a slight hill at the end. Inexperienced horses often find it difficult to negotiate, and if you are having a bet in a Flat maiden, it's definitely best to stick with those who have some level of experience under their belt. I've had a look at the 349 maidens ran since 2003, and of these, 307 runners had an official rating below 70. Such horses are best avoided and those rated 70 and above have a far greater win rate in proportion to the number entered in each race.

The Draw

Nothing hugely significant, although in five furlong races, the lower drawn horses tend to have a slight advantage. In general, stall one produces a disproportionate amount of winners, but the samples are small and probably not hugely reliable.

The least you need to know!

Bellewstown is set in the beautiful county Meath countryside and only has two meetings per year. Known as 'Baile Na Cgailleach' in the Irish language, this directly translates to 'Town of the hags' in English!

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