William Hill Trophy trends

The William Hill Trophy is the first handicap of the Cheltenham Festival.

It is run over 3 miles at a break neck pace and provides horses with a thorough test of stamina.

Front runners, horses carrying over 11 stone & those not proven over the distance should be avoided.

Form

Trainers want their Handicappers to come to the festival relavively unexposed with a nice low weight.

This explains why winning form in a horses previous race is less important in the William Hill Trophy than in the first three races that we analysed.

8 of the last 10 winners came in the first 4 in their last race. 7 of the last 10 winners won one of their last two races.

Also, the Raceform guide states that in the last 16 renewals, 15 winners were 1st or 2nd in one of their last 3 races.

Age

9 of the last 10 William Hill Trophy winners were aged between 7 & 10.

Horses aged 11 or over have a record of 1 win from 28 runners.

Only 1 of the other 27 11yo's was placed.

Weight

Horses carrying between 10 stone and 10-4 have a good win & place S/R and are responsible for 40% of the winners (26% of the runners).

Those carrying 11 stone or over have recorded 2 wins from 44 runners.

It is worth noting that on both occasions, the feild size was small (13 and 14 runners) and the going was good.

It is unlikely that this years renewal will have such a small field so I would rule out horses carrying high weights.

Starting Price

Favourites have a terrible record in the William Hill Trophy. None have won in the last 10 runnings.

I came across an interesting stat on the attheraces website, only 2 favourites have won this race since 1969.

Fancied horses do tend to do well with 8 of the winners starting between 5-1 & 12-1.

Previous experience

7 of the last 10 winners had ran in chases between 5 & 11 times.

8 winners had won between 2 & 6 times over fences.

Distance of previous race

5 of the winners ran over 3 miles last time out, 4 were dropping back in trip and one was stepping up in trip.

Summary

We need a horse carrying less than 11 stone, aged between 7 & 10 and that was placed (1st 4) in its last race.

The horse should be well fancied but not the favourite (priced between 5-1 & 12-1).

It should have ran in no more than 11 chases & won no more than 6 of them.