Last year's race Winner: Candleford Jockey: Tom Marquand Trainer: William J Haggas Owner: Barnane Stud Age: 4 Weight: 8st 12lbs Starting Price: 11/2 Season Form Figures: Seasonal debut Previous Best: 1st - Class 2 Handicap, Kempton (November 2021) By Paul Jones Our ideal contender will be a four or five-year-old arriving here off the back of a victory and drawn in double figures - three strong trends for this handicap over 1m4f for older horses, which produced just the two qualifiers last year in wide-margin winner Candleford and the third. In addition, the 2019 and 2021 winners also hit all three trends square on the head when giving Hughie Morrison and Mark Johnston, respectively, their fourth wins in this race. A fourth strong trend for this competitive handicap is that six of the last 11 winners started favourite or second-favourite. Horses drawn wider in double-figure stalls have won all 12 runnings since the switch of stall numbers, so don’t be put off by arguments suggesting the higher-drawn horses are up against it over this 1m4f trip. In fact, five of the first six home last year were drawn in double-figure stalls, and in 2017 the 1-2-4 were drawn 19, 18, 17 a year after a 1-2-3 for runners drawn 19, 13 and 15. Four-year-olds have historically fared best and filled seven of the first eight places in 2019, but two years earlier Rare Rhythm led home a 1-2-3 for five-year-olds following on from a 1-2-3-4 for the same age group in 2016. Prior to that, four-year-olds supplied seven of the first eight places in 2015, the first eight horses home in 2014, and six of the first seven in 2013. What isn’t a great surprise is that horses aged 6+ have struggled, with just three proving successful in the last 34 years. Last-time-out winners hold the call having been responsible for over half the winners in the last 28 years (15-13), which is an excellent return given they supply, on average, around 25% of the total runners. Candleford was the second winning seasonal debutant in six years last season. Sir Michael Stoute has saddled six winners and three runners-up from his last 19 runners, and the majority view is that his Kings Fete (a close-up third) would have won in 2016 but for being squeezed up. Given the handicap has become much more condensed of late, weight stats have started to become irrelevant in a race where it usually paid to oppose those towards the lower end of the handicap. At a glance summary Positives: Drawn 10+ Last-time-out winners First four in the market Trained by Hughie Morrison, Sir Michael Stoute or Charlie Johnston Negatives: Aged six or older