Handicapping issues

Desert Orchid

Desert Orchid

Senior Jockey
Joined
Aug 2, 2005
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Rather than take the GN thread off at a tangent, I thought I'd get this up and running if only to canvass opinion.

Does anyone have strong views about handicapping in the UK and/or Ireland?

For my part, I think Mr Smith has been brilliant for UK racing. He has pretty much revolutionised the art. He was the one who identified and corrected slippage not long after taking up the post and he has been brilliant for the National.

I'm filled with dread at the prospect of Dominic Gardiner-Hill taking over. I recall from his days at the RP that he was very narrow in his views. His style of handicapping is well suited to Dubai where generally speaking there is a very narrow band of ability on show. But I wonder how he will cope here with the same issues that faced Phil Smith.

Heading out for a hospital appointment now so won't be able to reply till later.
 
Desert Orchid said:
Rather than take the GN thread off at a tangent, I thought I'd get this up and running if only to canvass opinion.

Does anyone have strong views about handicapping in the UK and/or Ireland? I'm filled with dread at the prospect of Dominic Gardiner-Hill taking over.

Heading out for a hospital appointment now so won't be able to reply till later.
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Jeez Mo - don't be taking it that seriously, I'm sure he'll work out fine.
 
Phil Smith has established lines of communication between handicappers and the public that never existed before, and I imagine communication with trainers is also much improved. The other side of that coin is that he is also a bit of an attention seeker but that is no mortal sin.

The effort to make the National more attractive to higher class horses was a well timed initiative, given the big changes that were also being made to the track itself and especially the fences. I read somewhere recently that he now intends to tone down the adjustments made for the National which is probably fair enough given its growing similarity to other staying handicaps.

He has stepped onto dodgy ground a few times. He started by making a general upward adjustment to the Irish ratings of horses going to race in the UK. I criticised the way this was done at the time, but given the results in big handicaps in the UK in recent years he was justified in doing so (we're talking about jumps only, mind).

What is more controversial however was when he also started making his own ratings of Irish horses relative to other Irish horses based on Irish form. One of the horses he did this to was Presenting Percy, and in that particular case it turns out he was well justified. In general it is not the best way to conduct business but as long as he's right he can get away with it.
 
He has been known to give a low mark to ensure that a horse doesn't get in a Festival race, most recently The Crafty Butcher in the 2017 Kim Muir. Let's face it, for NH racing 5lb is only a single bad jump so it's pointless getting too exercised about it unless it makes the horse in question unable to compete through being too highly or too lowly rated.
 
So the O'Leary's have resorted to their nasty and bullying tactics “The Grand National is a fantastic race but it can only get better when Phil Smith goes.” 12 days before the weights are announced. Hopefully, he will be professional enough to ignore this petulance; not sure I would be if I was handicapping my last National.
 
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