King Of Stats: 30-strong field narrowed to two in Britannia Stakes

The Britannia Stakes is the big handicap on Ladies’ Day at Royal Ascot, with 30 runners lining up over the same course and distance as the Royal Hunt Cup on day two of the meeting, albeit with a lesser prize pool.

Things didn’t go right for the King of Stats in the Royal Hunt Cup as Munaaser finished as good as last. Here is a chance at redemption.

Only one of the last 12 winners had more than three previous runs in the same season

Clearly a horse that is over-raced is far from ideal heading into the Britannia Stakes, while fewer runs also ensures that an entrant is less likely to be fully exposed to the handicapper.

Taking this into account, it is no surprise that the majority of those eliminated by this statistic are towards the top of the weights.

Lexington Times, War Envoy, Hail The Hero, Carry On Deryck, Jolly Good Kitten, Crescent, Bow And Arrow, Sugar Boy and Resonant will struggle to triumph based on this trend.

10 of the last 12 winners carried 8-13 or less to victory

The last seven winners also fit into this trend and although most of those towards the head of the weights have already been discounted, the remainder can now be too.

Room Key, likely favourite Mutarakez, Sahaafy, Make It Up and Amazour all will find winning additionally difficult.

10 of the last 12 victors failed to win their previous race, but same number placed last time

A failure to win last time is another factor that can help prevent a weight hike from the handicapper and ensure that a horse gets in from a potentially lucrative mark.

Another seven horses failed to finish in the first three in their final start before arriving at Royal Ascot. They are Dancetrack, Azraff, Heartbreak Hero, Portage and Emirates Airline, alongside bottom-weighted pair Auspicion and Jargon.

All barring two of the past 12 winners had previously tasted victory over either 7f or 1m

The Britannia Stakes is run over a quick 7f and so a little extra stamina is arguably a better attribute than speed over sprint distances.

Quick Defence and Malaf have both failed to win over distances shorter than 8.5f.

Two thirds of the last nine winners came from a double-figure stall

Draw biases are noted in some races and it clearly pays to be positioned away from the inside rail in the Britannia. The first six home in the Royal Hunt Cup came from a double-figure stall.

Rotherwick and Yorkshire Dales are unfortunate to be classified among the non-winners having been drawn in stalls eight and nine respectively, while Udododontu will break from stall three.

10 of the last 12 winners had never run at Ascot before

Strangely, of all of the 30 entrants, none have ever tasted victory at Ascot before.

However, of the final four horses standing in this stats breakdown, Capel Path is the only one to have experience of the course, finishing second last time off a 1lb lower mark than here.

Of the final three, Sacrificial seems to have reached his potential and this makes him hard to fancy with no improvement forecast.

This leaves King To Be and Bartel, who are both running from career-high marks here.

Slight preference is given to the former from the Richard Hannon team, who has shown a higher quality of form on grass and was highly unlucky last time. A stronger gallop here should suit.

King To Be is 14/1 and the average starting price of the last 10 Britannia winners is a smidgen just over 14/1.

All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.

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