History Books Offer Little Help to Sky Bet Ebor Form Students
The one-mile six-furlong Sky Bet Ebor Handicap is one of the most popular betting races of the entire flat season. Staged at York, on land popularly known as the ‘Knavesmire’, the flat and wide racecourse with its four-and-a-half furlong straight, offers few hard-luck stories. The best horse on the day, at the weights, normally wins the Ebor.
William Haggas has never won the Sky Bet Ebor but he has four very strong contenders in Saturday’s race. ©GettyImages
However, there has been just one winning favorite of the Ebor Handicap since 1998. That horse was Purple Moon, trained by the now retired Luca Cumani, in 2007.
Carrying nine-stone four-pounds, Purple Moon was clearly well-weighted as he went on to finish second in the Melbourne Cup just a few months later. Interestingly, the last nine Sky Bet Ebor winners have shouldered between nine-stone and nine-stone nine-pounds.
Another piece of stand-out form found in the history books is the recent success of Irish trained horses in this tricky staying handicap. During the past 12 years horses trained in Ireland have won the race five times. The most recent Irish success was in 2019 when Mustajeer scored for trainer Ger Lyons and jockey Colin Keane.
These are the only two pieces of meaningful form you can extract from the list of previous winners as no trainer or jockey has won this race more than once during the past 20 years.
Narrowing the Field
12 of the initial 58 entries were Irish trained horses, four have got into the race: Sonnyboyliston, Mirann, Mt Leinster and Shanroe. All are set to carry a ‘case weight’ between nine-stone and nine-stone nine-pounds.
Officially two horses are considered ‘well in’ meaning their official rating will be higher in the future. So, if this race were staged next week, they would be allotted a heftier racing weight. They are Tribal Craft and Away He Goes.
Perhaps the best way to make your Ebor selection is by assessing the recent form of trainers with runners in the race. Normally the name Aidan O’Brien listed alongside a horse in a British handicap strikes fear into the hearts of bookies.
On Thursday morning when the final declarations for the Ebor were made Aidan O’Brien, a trainer with over 300 Group 1 victories on this CV, was operating at a miserable six percent strike-rate.
He had turned out just two winners from 33 runners. One of those winners came at Arlington Park in the USA. The Irishman’s only Ebor entry was Passion. However, that horse was not amongst the final declarations for the Ebor. Given the current form of the O’Brien yard, maybe that was a good thing.
Haggas Horses Are in Irresistible Form
At the other end of the spectrum William Haggas has had a remarkable recent winning spree. His past 43 runners have yielded 15 winners. Backing all of his horses to a level-stake over the past fortnight would have given you over 27 points in profit.
The trainer initially had six horses entered in the Ebor, it is a race he has never won before. Four stand their ground and they all appear to have exceptionally strong credentials.
Ilaraab never raced as a two-year-old but he quickly found the winning thread scoring on his second start and building up a sequence of six consecutive victories. He has run and won twice at York and while beaten last time at Ascot, that race was a stronger Group 2 contest.
Haggas has been quoted as saying another of his runners, Hamish, “needs some rain” or ease in the ground. So, the trainer and his supporters will be keeping a keen-eye on York’s weather forecast.
This horse won a big-field staying handicap at the course on good-going in August 2019. However, he stepped up considerably on that performance when winning over course and distance for a second time two months later. On that day the ground was officially described as ‘soft’.
Hamish is an intriguing candidate as he has only run twice since that second York victory, and he has not been seen in competitive action for 14 months. Nevertheless, the bookies are very cautious offering just 10/1 about him winning.
The Two Escobars
As full-brothers, sired by Galileo out of the Group 3 winning mare Bewitched, Haggas other two Ebor runners have captivating names: Pablo Escobarr and Roberto Escobarr. Naming horses after real-life characters is nothing new, but full-brothers being named after real-life brothers and racing in the same contest is quite possibly unique.
The betting suggests Roberto Escobar – the younger of the two horses but older real-life character – will perform best. Six career starts have yielded two victories, both at York, and like Hamish he has scored over the Ebor trip of one-mile six-furlongs.
Despite the poor record of favorites in the Ebor the market leader, Live Your Dream, has to be given serious consideration. However, at the 48-hour declaration stage the Saeed Bin Suroor trained horse was only listed as first reserve. He needs a late withdrawal to get a place in the 22-runner field.
Gelded after three starts as a two-year-old, he was off the track for almost two years before re-appearing in a low-level handicap in April 2021. Successful there, he has improved at a rate of knots scoring twice more since.
Most recently he won Newmarket’s bet365 Handicap over 14 furlongs with plenty to spare. As form students like to say, he could be “a Group horse masquerading as a handicapper. “
