Horse Racing Strategy: Trainers to follow in March

Betting Strategy / Wayne Bailey / 01 March 2009 / Leave a Comment

Following numerous reader requests, Wayne Bailey's trainer to follow series returns. This month, he looks at the trainers to watch (or avoid!) in the month of March...

Firstly, thanks to those who emailed or posted kind comments regarding my previous 'trainer to follow' articles - it's always nice to know my work is read!

What I'm trying to do here is fairly simple. Basically, I try to find the trainers who perform consistently well at the given time of the year. A consistent strike-rate (and profit) year-on-year is one of the main things I look for, but I'll also go a step further and have a look at the current horses in training at each yard. If I believe their current string of horses can continue the trend, I'll follow the trainer. Similarly, if a trainer performs poorly at the given time of year, I'll consider laying their horses.

But I must give a number of health warnings: I'm aware that it's a simplistic approach, and people will have problems with it. A hot trainer does not go cold as soon as the first day of a new month occurs. But for data analysis purposes, we must have cut-off points and breaking the year into 12 segments has worked so far. Irish punters for example, will be aware that Noel Meade's best period is usually the months leading to Christmas, and the trainer usually has a cold spell in the new-year. But if one of his horses has an outstanding chance, I still may back it in January. In short, use this data as a guide, but more importantly - use your commons sense too.

The 'trainer to follow' articles have been recorded to £10 stakes at Betfair SP, and currently show a profit of £633.30 so we'll return to where we left off and continue to use £10 as the stake, whether it's back or lay. All data is from 2003 to the present.

Hurdles

Admittedly, it's a very small sample but Jim Best's hurdlers have performed well at this time of the year and he's had eight March winners from 37 races since 2003 and shows a small profit to level stakes. However, if we concentrate on the handicaps only, it becomes six winners from 25 races with a profit of over £250 to £10 stakes.

Michael Scudamore has sent out 58 hurdlers in March over the years without a single success. Personally, I don't like laying over [12.0] as the liabilities get too high, but I'd suggest that any of his horses at that price or under are worth taking on.

Chases

JR Cornwall has showed a March profit in recent years with 11 chase winners from 53 races. Had you put £10 on each, you'd show a profit of over £355.

All Weather

Terry Mills is worth following in the month of March and has had ten winners from 36 races since 2003. Had you followed each runner with a stake of £10, you'd show a profit of just over £130.

On the other end of the scale, JM Bradley has had just three March winners despite sending 102 horses to post, so I'm keen to lay at [12.0] or less.

Recommendations:

Back Jim Best's handicap hurdlers
Lay Michael Scudamore's hurdlers at 12.0 or less
Back JR Cornwall's Chasers
Back Terry Mills on the All-Weather
Lay JM Bradley on the All-Weather at 12.0 or less