Ruby’s The fall guy

Nick Pullen looks at the big upsets

McCoy’s last 165 rides at G1 or G2 level. They don’t call hime champ for nothing.

But what about the top jocks right now? What do their records show? • Brian Cooper’s last 167 G1 & G2 rides produced 6 fallers. • Barry Geraghty’s last 170 produced 8. • Richard Johnson’s last 174 produced 8. • Sam Twiston-Davies has fallen on 9 of his last 164 such rides. • Davy Russell hit the deck on 12 of his last 160. • Paul Townend has a record of 11 fallers from his last 168. • Noel Fehily has had 3 fallers in his last 151.

This tidies those figures up a bit Rider Falls Runs % RWalsh 11 150 7.3 B Cooper 6 167 3.5 B Geraghty 8 170 4.7 R Johnson 8 174 4.5 S Twiston-Davies 9 164 5.4 D Russell 12 160 7.5 PTownend 11 168 6.5 N Fehily 3 151 1.9

SoWalsh does fall more frequently than par. But these stats don’t tell the full story.

This table tells us something mor Rider 2/1< Runs % RWalsh 44 150 29.3 B Cooper 35 167 20.9 B Geraghty 39 170 22.9 R Johnson 20 174 11.4 S Twiston-Davies 39 164 23.7 D Russell 22 160 13.7 PTownend 27 168 16 N Fehily13 151 8.6

It tells us how many of each jockey’s rides under review were sent off at 2s or shorter. It tells us what proportion of each jockey’s rides was fancied and most likely to be competitive. As you’d expect – given the firepower available to him – Walsh rides more fancied horses in G1 & G2 races than his opponents.

Walsh rides more fancied horses in G1 & G2 races.And he’s been falling on more horses in G1 & G2 races

Perhaps the falls have nothing to do with complacency or falling asleep. Maybe Walsh has a higher proportion of fallers because a higher proportion of his rides are capable of winning,are ridden to win and,as such,are pushed to the edge in the heat of competition more frequently.

One or two of his falls have come when races appeared to be won and when he might have been expected to ease back on the throttle.

Maybe the fav-backers have a legitimate gripe? Maybe one or two of those odds-on shots that bombed out would have stood up under another jockey.

The bottom line is that RubyWalsh rides plenty of winners at the top level – more than anybody else.Those last 150 rides in G1 & G2 events – produced 58 winners at a strike-rate of 38.7%. Backers can surely have little to moan about?

But look more closely at that bottom line.Betting profit is not only hard to come by on thoseWalsh horses.It is non-existent. Despite producing 58 winners those 150 horses produced a 12 point loss backed to level stakes.

Maybe that’s why the fav-backers squeal so loudly when ‘a dead cert’ goes down underWalsh.At the prices they play at, the fav-backers need every single winner they can get.

Nick Pullen is the contrarian analyst behind Against the Crowd – a subscription service that seeks out the best-value bets at the prices in all the big races. For details go to: www.againstthecrowd.co.uk