2:10 – Luckofthedraw 11/2
Long term followers of mine will remember Luckofthedraw winning this race for us last season at 18/1! Unfortunately, he hasn’t been missed in the market this time around but that was to be expected.
The reasons for backing him again today remain largely the same as last season. In fact, he made my “Handicappers to follow first time out” list which you can find here: https://overandclear.com/2020/08/12/2020-21-national-hunt-6-handicappers-to-follow-first-time-out/
He’s clearly a horse who’s at his best fresh. His 4 wins to date have come after breaks of 199 days, 58 days, 186 days and 155 days respectively. His form often tails off after his reappearance, but to his credit he did run fairly well in his two most recent outings. Regardless, his mark has now dropped to 130, just 1lb higher than when winning this race last season.
Nigel Twiston-Davies has a 25% S/R in handicap chases at Market Rasen (A/E 1.3); that improves to 29% (A/E 1.62) when you look just at handicap chases at Market Rasen in September, highlighting that NTD tends to excel in the early stages of the season.
2m5f would appear to be his optimal trip and he’s fairly versatile in terms of ground. The ground is currently “good” at Market Rasen but there is a chance of rain. If that materialises, the conditions will be very similar to last year (good, good to soft in places)
Now looks the time to catch him and with conditions looking close to ideal, a big run is expected.
overandclear.com 