Jamie Lynch's Betfair Chase Preview: Why McCain's a man for Four Seasons

I promise to one day write an article that, halfway in, doesn't necessitate the line 'But what's that got to do with racing? Well...', but this isn't that day.

I'll name the top five songs, according to the official poll, and you name the category in question. 

5) Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, Mozart
4) Memory, Andrew Lloyd Webber
3) Greensleeves, anonymous
2) anything by Kenny G
1) Four Seasons, Vivaldi

Least likely covers on X-Factor? No. Clare Balding's Desert Island Discs? Not quite. Most used soundtracks to BBC4 programmes? Warmer.  The answer is: most common on-hold music. 

A person now spends, on average, 45 hours a year holding on the telephone. David Boyle of the New Economics Foundation, and writer of the book The Tyranny of Numbers, argues that 'most Britons probably spend more time each year listening to telephone hold music than they do making love.' I take umbrage with Mr Boyle's throwaway comment, because of the needless use of the words 'most' and 'probably'. Why not combine the two and ask to be put on hold while on a phone sex line. That always baffles them. Someone told me. 

Top of the Halt Parade then is Four Seasons, or Four Seasons (Winter) to be precise, one of the most recognisable pieces of music in the world, used regularly in commercials (if not so regularly as to save half of Timeform half a day trying to find examples - Peugeot 308, de Beers diamonds), as background music in the finer shops and restaurants, and as a drama-propeller in various movie sequences. Type it in, anyway. You'll know it.   

Four Seasons (Winter) comes in three distinct parts. The first - and most famous - movement is high-tempo, setting the pulse racing, before the pace and rhythm slows in the precursory middle section, and then the speed builds back up to the final crescendo. Fast, slow, fast. And it works a treat.    

But what's that got to do with racing? Well, it goes back to a conversation I had with Donald McCain at Bankhouse Stables earlier in the autumn, when we drifted from the Horses To Follow script, and drift we did, because that's the sort of engaging, easy-going guy he is. 

Son of Flicka was the subject, and the spark was a naïve remark by me about, however long range the plan for Cheltenham, the race itself didn't seem to be going to plan at halfway when the horse had drifted back through the field; the entry in the official form book began 'prominent, lost places before 4th...'

McCain's I-know-something-you-don't smile told a story. 'We have our way of doing things.'

What looked like Plan B or even C in effect was actually Plan A all along.

'So even when we're hanging onto one now, on the big days, we get them out and racing first, and then bring them back. Look back at Cheltenham, not just Son of Flicka, and you'll see Jason (Maguire) doing exactly that on three or four of ours.'

Like Four Seasons (Winter), it appears the McCain/Maguire methodology for the bigger days comes in three distinct parts. The first movement is high-tempo, getting the horse racing, before steadying the rhythm for the precursory middle section, and then the speed builds up for the final crescendo. Fast, slow, fast. And it worked a treat. 'That seems to work for us.' 

'Switching one off' is part of racing parlance, but a switched-on jockey makes sure the switch is on to begin with. 'Dropping a horse out from the start can sometimes be counter-productive,' said McCain. 'It's just about getting them in the right frame of mind for their big day.' 

Saturday is a big day for Weird Al, and getting one right for the big day is what it's all about for McCain. 'It's a challenge, but that's what my Dad taught me: to target one horse for one day and to have them ready for one day. If you do it right and get them to within at least a couple of days of where they need to be then you've got a chance of something special.'

Knowing when it's not the right day can sometimes be as important, keeping the powder dry so to speak, and that was the case for Weird Al in the Charlie Hall Chase, a race he won in 2011. 'He just wasn't quite ready for the Charlie Hall,' said McCain, 'but the Haydock race has long since been on my mind - they are a bunch of owners from the North-West, so the Betfair Chase always appealed.'

'The horse is now as fit as we can get him at home, and, considering the money, it doesn't look a great race, does it?'

That depends on Long Run. Cut back to the 2011 Gold Cup, when he ran away from Denman and Kauto Star on the uphill finish at Cheltenham, and Long Run looked king for the long run, but his star dimmed last term, eclipsed by a re-brightened Star named Kauto, including in the Betfair Chase. Long Run's Four Seasons have gone fast, faster, faster, slow. And he did look uncharacteristically slow at times. 

The fact is, though, in what was by common consent an underwhelming 2011/12 campaign by Long Run, in every race bar the Gold Cup, when he finished one place behind The Giant Bolster, he still ran to a higher Timeform rating than any of his Haydock opponents have ever achieved. McCain is right in that the Betfair Chase perhaps isn't a great race, and an 85% Long Run is better than each of the rest operating at 100%.

All the same, Haydock is only his first redemptive step and not the be all and end all for Long Run, whereas it's clearly Weird Al's big day, and that's one of several reasons why Weird Al might be able to give, as the football managers like to say, 110%. Another is his record when fresh. Weird Al has won - and improved a chunk - first time out in each of his last four seasons, and freshness is on his side coming here this time, unlike last year when third and just two lengths behind Long Run, after he'd worked his reappearance magic at Wetherby. 

Something else in his favour is the doubts about the opposition, and their number. Over his last three seasons, in double-figure fields, Weird Al's form figures read 8PPF, while in single-figure fields it's 111113, the 3 being this race last year behind Kauto and Long Run. He seems in his element, let alone adept, in a tactical scenario as the six-runner Betfair Chase could be, perhaps because, relative to most staying chasers, he has a high cruising speed and a fair turn of foot. 

Silviniaco Conti is obviously the up-and-comer, though he's priced up as if he's already in this league, but, on Timeform ratings, he didn't achieve quite so much in winning a thin Charlie Hall as Weird Al had the previous renewal. 

The percentage call is, of course, that Long Run will outclass the field, but it's no certainty after last season exposed chinks in his armour, while, under these specific circumstances, the percentage chance of Weird Al running the race of his life is high, and therefore the percentage chance of him winning the race is, for me, higher than the 12.5% suggested by his Betfair odds of 8.07/1. He's got freshness on his side, he's got conditions on his side, he's got the small field on his side and, perhaps most important of all, he's got on his side a trainer and jockey who, like Vivaldi, are capable of conjuring up something magical, in a well-thought-out rhythm. Look out for the Four Seasons (Winter) fast, slow, fast tempo of a McCain horse on a big day.