Archive for March, 2011

This year’s totesport Cheltenham Gold Cup is arguably one of the most open renewals in recent years, with many firms going around 7-2 the field. Last season’s winner of jump racing’s Blue Riband event, Imperial Commander, heads the market and Nigel Twiston-Davies’ charge will be bidding to become just the second horse since L’Escargot (1970-71) to win back-to-back Gold Cups. Best Mate, who made it three wins in a row in 2004, is the only horse in recent years to achieve the feat.

Imperial Commander was due to run in the King George at Kempton following his reappearance victory in the Betfair Chase at Haydock, but suffered a setback. Reports emanating from the Twiston-Davies yard have been upbeat, though, and he goes well fresh, and loves Cheltenham – he has won five of his six starts over fences at Prestbury Park. Imperial Commander is now aged 10 and only one 10-year-old, Cool Dawn in 1998, has won the Gold Cup since ’93. Conversely, the Fleminsfirth gelding has few miles on the clock for a horse of his age.

Kauto Star became the first horse to regain the Gold Cup in 2009, and Denman, so impressive when winning the Festival showpiece in 2008, will be bidding to emulate his stablemate on March 18. Kauto Star, a top-priced 13-2 with Coral at the time of writing, will join an elite group consisting of Golden Miller, Cottage Rake, Arkle and Best Mate if he manages to register a third Gold Cup victory. However, he was well held in the King George at Kempton in January and, as an 11-year-old, he has a major age stat to overcome: no horse older than 10 has landed this prestigious chase since What A Myth prevailed as a 12-year-old in 1969.

Denman is also 11, so it could be that although he is more than double the price of his two illustrious stablemates, the year younger Neptune Collonges could emerge as champion trainer Paul Nicholls’ best chance of a winner in the 2011 Gold Cup. The grey appeared to be back to his best when landing the Argento Chase at the Gloucestershire venue in his latest start and the 33-1 widely available doesn’t look bad value at all, particularly from an each-way betting perspective.

At the other end of the age scale, Long Run, generally second favourite for the Gold Cup, also has a major stat to overcome. Indeed, no horse aged six has won this race since Mill House in 1963. Nicky Henderson’s charge was an emphatic winner of the King George when last seen out, but there are still many that question whether the French import possesses the requisite stamina for the Gold Cup’s 3m 2½f trip, especially on an undulating track like Cheltenham.

Irish raiders Kempes and Pandorama are progressive types, while Midnight Chase has gone from strength-to-strength this season. The last-named is unbeaten in four starts over fences at Cheltenham (his last three victories have all been gained at the track) and his bold jumping will be an asset. The scene is set for a fascinating Gold Cup and it will be most interesting to see whether punters decide that Imperial Commander is a banker or blowout shortly before 3.20 on the last day of the 2011 Festival.
For more information on the Gold Cup see our gold cup trends page, gold cup tips page or check out a list of the top runners in the 2011 gold cup here.

Please give us your opnion below of who will win the 2011 Gold Cup. Is Imperial Commander a banker?

The odds which you are able to obtain on each of your Cheltenham bets could mean the difference between winning and losing. Where is the best place to find your value for the Cheltenham Festival? Bookmakers, Tote, Betfair or www.valuechecker.co.uk?

Come race day, for those that have not already committed themselves fully financially on the Ante Post markets, punters across the land will be looking to pace bets and find the best value they can for their bets. These days we have a myriad of options for both on course and stay at home punters.

The first port of call should be an odds comparison site such as www.valuechecker.co.uk where you can see all the biggest bookmakers prices in a line to find which is offering the best price on your selection. Then we have the choice of going to bookies, backing online with a firm, or playing on the exchanges which often offer better odds. (Don’t forget to factor in the commission here). Then if you are on course there is the choice of the Rails Bookmakers or the Tote windows.

This is all well and good for taking a price, but those odds can move before the race is off and the Sp’s can change come off time. So, we take a quick look at some examples from last years results to find where the best Sp prices were to be found.

In the main there was little gain in taking morning odds against eventual Sp. Notable exceptions would be A new Story in the Cross Country who could have been had at 40/1 in the am, only to return at 25′s. Sanctuaire was gambled from 13/2 into 4/1 favouritism and two further winners were available at 50/1 morning odds only to return 33/1 (Berties Dream) and 16/1 Pigeon Island which was some gamble. All in all there were 9 that returned shorter odds than their morning prices that were better than SP, Tote Sp or Betfair Sp.

Betfair Sp returned 13 of the winners better than any available price on the day including a whopping 84.55 on the Bumper winner Cue Card. That returned 40/1 on industry and at 60.6/1 on the Tote.

The Tote paid the biggest on four winners, Chief Dan George (51.7/1), Spirit River (18.3/1), Great Endeavour (30.3/1) and marginally on Pause and Clause (20.3/1).

Industry Sp did not return a single winner better than any price available on the day

All in all, it seems we can take a morning price, but need to anticipate the contractions if doing so.

If betting at home, check www.valuechecker.co.uk before placing bets if taking a price, otherwise, Betfair Sp performed admirably. If you dont have a Betfair account, click here to open one and claim a £25 free bet.

If on course, the Tote and industry Sp differed very little across the whole meeting, so have some fun trying to find the best price you can in the melee that is the busiest betting ring of them all.

Which is your favourite way of betting for the best returns?

After looking at the likelihood of big odds winners at the Festival in his last blog, Spread Betting tips for the Cheltenham Festival,  Billy Blakeman looks at how we can profit from Cheltenham festival favourites.

There is no better way to ensure an interest in all 27 of this year’s festival races than to buy or sell the performance of the favourites across the meeting. Every race will have one of course, no matter which horses don’t make the final line-up and this is an interesting and fun market to get involved with. The scoring is simple – 25 points are awarded for a winning favourite, 10 for a second place and 5 for a third. Note that if there are joint favourites, the horse with the lowest racecard number will be deemed the favourite for this market. If you don’t have a spread betting account, now is the time to open one with some very generous free bet offers from both Sporting Index and Extrabet.

One of the things that makes this market intriguing, is the fact that we do not yet know which horse will be sent of as favourite in many of the races; in fact that goes for all the races really! So where do we start? Well lets find both ends of the rope. At one end, we have some of the big handicaps where the favourite might currently be 8/1+ and there are maybe a dozen possible favourites at this stage. This kind of race is difficult to assess therefore as we would be guessing the favourite’s name, never mind assessing how we think it will perform.

On the other end of the scale, we have Quevega in the DN Mares hurdle who is likely to be around even money or even odds-on. It is reasonable to assume Willie Mullins mare will be the designated favourite and we can form an opinion on how she will perform. There are other warm favourites of course, Cue Card and Time For Rupert spring immediately to mind. It is these races that we need to assess in detail to determine a view on the favourite rather than the races where there is great uncertainty. If I think Quevega will run poorly and don’t particularly subscribe to Cue Card, on those two opinions alone it is very unlikely I should be buying the favourites but I would probably be looking to sell. Basically, you need to concentrate on the races where you have more visibility and accept that something like the County Hurdle is not easily read.

The Coral Cup, the Pertemps Final, County Hurdle etc. warrant an additional mention. By normal probability, we would expect to see only one winning favourite in 10 years so when the stats fans trot out that the Coral Cup is a bad race for favourites etc, that is misleading. These difficult handicaps are the friend of the Festival Favourites buyers. This is because only a small return in terms of points would be expected from these races. I won’t go through the maths here but a winning County Hurdle favourite will effectively earn you far more points than the spread firm judged would be the case. Remember, the spreads are a mathematical calculation so a 9/1 favourite can equally be called a 9/1 outsider given the relatively small expectation of success. If three or four of this type of race go to the day of race favourite, backers will probably have a superb meeting.

By contrast, horses like Quevega, Cue Card and Time for Rupert are the friends of sellers. Because there is a high expectation, then say if Qevega finished second, that would still be bad for buyers as she will earn less points than the spread firms allocated. If she fails to finish, that will be a very bad result for buyers.

So, to summarise, we can only take a ‘vanilla’ view of some of the races where the favourite could be one of many but we do need to look closely at the races with shorter priced known favourites and take a view on these races as these will effectively determine which way we should play.

A quick look down the AP markets shows that there are quite a few races where the favourite is reasonably strong and of course a few with 10/1 favs currently. I don’t have scope in this article to go through each race in detail but the current spread is 205-214 and my summary thoughts are;

I do not think Binocular will be strong in the Champion Hurdle market and I expect Menorah, or possibly Hurricane Fly to be favourite on the day. Quevega looks pretty bomb-proof, Cue Card I don’t have a strong opinion either way but if he doesn’t win, I think he will be placed and I like Imperial Commander. Overall, I tend to just favour buying and that does give you a positive interest throughout the Festival. Often the negative bet is better value for that reason but this is once a year and I think the favourites have a generally strong look this year so that’s the bet, even though I am mindful that in both 2008 and 2010, there were only 2 and 4 winning favourites respectively but this year could see revenge for favourite backers.

Buy Festival Favourites at 214 with extrabet

Marc Owen Banks shares some more of his stats with us as he poses the question; Coming to the Festival, How important is a recent run?

See our main Cheltenham Betting site for the latest odds on all the races, stats, trends and tips.

This is a really interesting question in the run up to the 2011 Festival at Cheltenham and something from a personal point of view I have considered. Looking at all results over the years, there is a consistent trend towards runners that had their last outing between 21 and 60 days prior to running their race at the festival and doing better than those with shorter or longer breaks. How coincidental this is, is purely a matter of opinion but the stats suggest that runners that had their last run within this time frame were 3 times more likely to be a winner than others outside.

Of course, this is just a generalised view based on all runners in every race. Each horse will act differently than others. Some need a competitive race very quickly after another, and others can act perfectly well after a lengthy time off. Quevega is a prime example of this. She won the David Nicholson Mares Only hurdle at the 2009 Festival, then contested the Irish Champion hurdle at Punchestown. We didn’t see her until she made a winning seasonal début in the same Cheltenham race last year. She stepped up in trip at Punchestown and took on the World Series Hurdle subsequently this time but again, the first time we will see her on the race track this season is in the David Nicholson where she will obviously be attempting the Hat Trick of wins, all off of a long break from competitive racing.

Runners who are appearing within ten days of a previous run here at the festival have produced just one winner since 2009, Those that have been off the track for 100 days or more have produced just 6 winners from 200 qualifiers. Its the area in the middle we need to consider and in particular as mentioned those between 21 and 60 days.

2011 could be very different though! With the sustained cold weather and mass of abandoned meetings we will be seeing more runners coming into the meeting after longer breaks than in previous years, so the stats may well be thrown out this time round and be just as effective between 60 and 99 days

We will have questions as to how fit some will be, and if indeed they will be fully wound up for their respective races. We know that connections will be training them to perfection for the day but what effect will a lack of competitive runs have on their performance on the day. Will they be one run short of full effectiveness?

An example of one who can be effective at around the 100 day mark is Nigel Twiston Davies 2010 Gold Cup winner. Imperial Commander will be trying to retain the trophy after just a single run in the Lancashire Chase at Haydock. Last season, before coming to Cheltenham, he had placed second (Arguably) behind Kauto Star in the same race before running in the King George at Kempton. He is an example of one outside the 21-60 days for whom it would not seem to matter but with the weather affecting his preparation, will he be in the same shape as the twice raced Imperial Commander of last season?

Who do you think will run well despite a long break coming in and is still worth backing and who do you think has not had enough competitive preparation and will constitute a lay?

Should Previous Course Experience be a Key Factor When Looking For Future Festival Winners?

Marc Owen Banks churns up some interesting stats for us to identify whether or not we should concentrate on Cheltenham runners with previous course form when planning our Cheltenham Betting.

I once remember a quote in racing that pretty much went along the lines of “class is class no matter what the going”. It’s not exact but this was in direct reference to what difference the underfoot conditions made to lower class/rated horses in comparison to top end thoroughbreds. The general consensus being, once the upper echelons of class are considered, the going didn’t matter as much, as a class horse, is class regardless of conditions.

The same may be true when it comes to course conditions. Whether a track is flat or undulating, whether the course is left or right handed, although I think there would be a sterner argument against that latter as there is certainly a distinct preference in most cases in my mind. So the question is – Are the general thoughts that course experience can be key, well founded in regards runners at the Festival?

I ran some figures through my software. Looking at previous festivals I filtered out every runner that had never raced at Cheltenham previously. I then did the same for those that had, and even took it a little further and looked at only those runners who had previous “Festival” form in the book.

What I found was, if last year we had backed every runner that had previously run at the Festival we would have found ourselves striking no less than 270 bets! I wasn’t expecting so many. This number has consistently increased since 2003 when just 195 were making at least a second appearance at the festival. It should be noted that a fourth day has been added since then however. In any case, if anyone was mad enough to back every one last year they would have walked away in profit to the tune of £16.77 to £1 level stakes. Not a strategy I would recommend for 2011, it is just a 6.7% Return on investment.

Cheltenham’s courses, old and new, are idiosyncratic though and must suit certain runners, so I thought including every runner who had previously run on the course was not such a good idea, as they may have run badly previously, perhaps not suited by the track. So I took only those that had run into a place previously on the track at a festival and run through again. I found 28 runners that had previously placed at a festival came back and either won or placed again last year. 10 of those were winners! 2010 was not unique in finding previously festival placed horses winning and placing once again. This is something that shows up as providing winners year in year out a well as some attractively priced places. The technique will not find you every winner, but it will find you some very interesting short-lists from which you may find some nice priced winners, 2010 included Weapons Amnesty and Pigeon Island.

This year there are a whole host of runners coming back from last year and previous festival. Try to find one in the Gold Cup that hasn’t run here before!!!

There are a number looking to retain titles as well. Imperial Commander in the Gold Cup, Binocular,  the Champion Hurdle and Quevega is looking for three on the trot in the David Nicholson Mares Only Hurdle.

Which previous festival winners and placed runners, will you be looking at, to perform well once again in 2011?

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Dylan Jenear looks at the 2011 Champion Chase posing the question banker or blow out?

The sportingbet.com Queen Mother Champion Chase is always an enthralling contest in which the speed merchants of the chasing division do battle. Master Minded heads the market with most firms, but the eight-year-old has lost the aura of invincibility which he once held. The Paul Nicholls-trained chaser was so impressive in winning the 2008 and 2009 renewals of this contest, and he appeared to be back to something akin to his best when scoring at Ascot and Cheltenham in his first two starts this term.

However, back at the former venue in January he just scraped home ahead of Somersby, one of his likely Champion Chase rivals, and Master Minded was put in his place when fourth in this race last year, a renewal which went to Ireland’s Big Zeb, who is second in the betting with most firms, but joint favourite in places. The latter may well retain his crown if at his best on March 16, but he is far from infallible, as Golden Silver demonstrated when outpointing Colm Murphy’s charge at Punchestown at the end of January.

Are Master Minded and Big Zeb bankers or blowouts? Master Minded has a tough task in bidding to become just the third horse since 1959 to regain his crown in the Champion Chase – Royal Relief was successful in 1972 and ’74, beaten in the ’73 renewal, while Moscow Flyer was victorious in this prestigious two-mile chase either side of his defeat in the 2004 running. Moreover, of those that have attempted to win the Champion Chase three times, only Badsworth Boy, who registered his third win in the race in 1985, has succeeded.

The portents are brighter for Big Zeb. Since the inaugural running of the Champion Chase in 1959, nine horses have recorded back-to-back victories. However, there are some up-and-coming chasers that he will need to thwart, including Woolcombe Folly, stablemate of Master Minded, Somersby and French Opera. The last-named, who is generally a 20-1 chance, is a massive 48.0 on Betfair at the time of writing. Nicky Henderson’s charge does need to improve to land this championship event, but his record over fences at Cheltenham reads 3112, and he looked better than ever when landing the Game Spirit Chase at Newbury last time.

What do you think? Please add your comments below.
For more information on the Champion Chase please check out our Champion Chase trends and stats here

We continue our series of posts looking at the Cheltenham Festival Betting favourites, the best bankers and the likely blow outs.  Here Marc Owen Banks shares the key stats with us and gives us his verdict on which favourites you can bank on and which you should lay.

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Everyone loves a favourite don’t they? Every punter across the land has their Banker for the week lined up, sometimes, weeks or months in advance. Who are the bankers for 2011 and how can we expect them to get on. Will the smiles be on the faces of happy punters or happier layers on the rails?

Here we take a look into past performances of the favourites over recent seasons at the festival and see if there any angles to be had in backing a shortie at arguably the most competitive National Hunt meeting of them all.

Since 2002 there have been 3970 runners take on the Prestbury Park course over the Festival week; Of those, 226 have been sent off Sp favourite, singularly, joint or Co-Favs. Of those 226 favourites, 50 have returned home first to justify the support. That is a below average 22% strike rate, and as you might imagine, if backing them all blindly there would be a hole in the pocket of the favourite backer. A 15% loss of investment equates to a £32.40 loss to every pound invested.

A quick look at each year in isolation shows us that this has not been the case every year and in fact the biggest losses have been seen only in recent seasons, 2010 would have seen a 12.17 loss as only four favourites scored in 27 races. The year the bookies made hay was 2008. Just 2 winning favourites meant a whopping loss of 75% of the bank. So perhaps this is the year when the bookies take a hiding again?

Only three years in the last ten would have seen favourite backers bank a profit. 2006 was the last time, then 2004 and in 2003 10 of the 22 races were won by favourites.

So will this year be a week for the backers or layers?

There is one angle that has proven to be a profitable one for backing the market leaders over the years. Surprisingly, it would seem the “Bankers” as they are described don’t do so badly. If following only those priced between Evens and 15/8 blindly a strike rate of 50% would have been had with 16 winners from 32 qualifiers. For a £7.67 profit or 23%ROI.

Ruby Walsh is not a bad bet when on a favourite, he has ridden 40 favourites in the time frame researched, scoring with 15of those for a 37% strike rate and £12.38 profit to level stakes would have kept many happy.

So who are this years bankers? Who do we back and who do we lay?.My thoughts in brackets

Supreme Novices Hurdle – Cue Card  (BACK)

Champion Hurdle – Binocular  (BACK)

David Nicholson Hurdle – Quevega  (LAY)

RSA – Time For Rupert  (BACK)

Champion Chase – Master Minded  (LAY)

World Hurdle – Big Bucks  (LAY)

Gold Cup – Imperial Commander  (BACK)

Foxhunters Chase – Baby Run (LAY)

I predict  four of these will win at most, and if playing  a Yankee would include

Cue Card – Binocular – Time For Rupert and Imperial Commander.

Many punters love nothing more than an ante-post double, treble or an accumulator on favourites of the big races at the Cheltenham Festival.  Over a series of posts we will be looking ahead to this year’s four-day extravaganza at Prestbury Park in attempt to identify which of the big-race market leader’s bankers  and which will be blowouts!

We start with the Champion Hurdle

The Stan James Champion Hurdle promises to be a fascinating contest. At the time of writing, last year’s hero Binocular is favourite across the board to become the first horse since Hardy Eustace (2004 and 2005) to land back-to-back Champion Hurdles. Nicky Henderson’s charge was impressive last year, but he faces sterner opposition this time round in what looks a vintage renewal of the Grade One event.

It could turn out to be churlish to read too much into the fact that Binocular was beaten by one of the main challengers to his crown on March 15, Peddlers Cross, in the Fighting Fifth Hurdle earlier this season. Indeed, he was below par in that race last term, too. But he was rather laboured in winning at odds of 1-10 in the Contenders Hurdle at Sandown last time, which is disconcerting, even allowing for the fact that Henderson wouldn’t have had the gelding fully tuned-up for that assignment.

In the 2010 Champion Binocular beat some very good hurdlers, including runner-up Khyber Kim who will renew rivalry on March 15. However, it’s not hard to pick holes in the form, particularly with Go Native, who was sent off the 11-4 favourite, failing to run any sort of a race. Furthermore, the reigning champion will be up against not only his Newbury nemesis Peddlers Cross, but also up-and-coming types like Menorah and Oscar Whisky, while there are two very intriguing raiders from the Emerald Isle to consider in Hurricane Fly and Dunguib.

Menorah excels when faced with the unique undulations of Cheltenham – he is unbeaten in three starts at the track. Philip Hobbs’ representative, winner of the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle last season, gave lumps of weight and a beating to Bothy when reappearing in the Greatwood Handicap Hurdle – a race Hobbs’ Rooster Booster won en route to Champion Hurdle glory in 2003 – and added the International Hurdle to his CV when last seen out in December. His street-fighter qualities will make him a serious contender.

The main concern surrounding Peddlers Cross is whether he will have the requisite pace to win a Champion Hurdle, a question mark which also hangs over Oscar Whisky, while Hurricane Fly is something of a dark horse. Willie Mullins’ great white hope has been turned over just once in eight starts since joining Ireland’s champion trainer, having been brought over from France, but he has never raced on UK soil before and, moreover, the frenetic pace of the Champion will be unlike anything he has previously encountered.

So is Binocular a banker or a blowout? It’s an intriguing question. At around the 7-2 mark he is priced up fairly in my opinion, but he faces a sterner test than last year – the sternest test of his career, in fact – and by backing him you would have to do so in the belief that Henderson has left plenty to work on between his Sandown victory and the Champion.

What do you think?

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Between now and the Supreme Novices’ ‘Roar’ on Tuesday, we will be looking at some of the Festival Markets and to kick-off with an easy one, let’s consider the ‘Biggest Winning SP’ index.

Quite simply, the biggest winning SP across the four-days constitutes the make/up and the quote with extrabet.com is currently  47.5 – 49*, with a maximum make up of 100.

Since the festival was switched to 4-days in 2005, the highest winning SP’s have been 40/1, 50/1, 50/1, 66/1, 33/1 & 40/1.

Had we bought each year at 49, we would have had three profitable years but on average, lost 2.5 times our unit stake. So that’s a poor result? No, I don’t think it is. Remember that we could have a 100/1 winner, a result which would give us a massive 51 point profit or an 80/1 winner giving a profit of 31 points.

Playing with scenarios, if we felt we could stand the loss of 2.5 points each year (and accept what I think is a very worst case scenario of a 33/1 winner being the highest SP in any one year – losing 16 points), then we could have 20 years of 2.5 average loss but be in profit if the 21st year turned up a 100/1 winner. If there happened to be a couple of years in 21 where the winning SP was 100/1, then we would be 103.5 points up, a good return.

My feeling is that is a genuine chance of a 66/1, 80/1 or 100/1 victor over the four days and I would be surprised if we did not see an SP of at least 40/1. My conclusion therefore is that this market has very limited upside for sellers but a big potential for buyers, with real prospects of a decent return. I recommend buying at 49* with extrabet.com.

Note that the content of this article is the opinion of the author and does not constitute financial advice. Spread betting carries a high risk and it is essential to understand the risks involved before placing a bet.

*Prices may fluctuate.

Not since Cool Dawn in 1998 has a horse aged 10 won the Cheltenham Gold Cup. Trained by Robert Alner and ridden by Andrew Thornton, Cool Dawn defied odds of 25/1 to become the first 10 year old to win the race since Cool Ground just 6 years earlier in 1992.

The history of the race is littered with 10 year old winners, Eleven of them in fact, the first of them Easter Hero in 1930. There was no Gold Cup in 1937. If there had of been, perhaps Golden Miller could have won as a ten year old after winning the race for the previous five consecutive years aged 5 to 9.

The common take now is that we will not see a ten year old winning the race. If we look at the current Cheltenham betting, this would eliminate the chances of most of the leading lights for this years race. Last years winner Imperial Commander will be ten this time round. Twice previous winner Kauto star last won aged nine, two years ago, that makes him 11. His stable mate Denman, fancied by many to be able to match Kauto and win again in 2011, is the same age.

As much as this may open up the argument for Long Run followers, it should be remembered that Nicky Hendersons gelding is only six years old. If the record for ten year olds is bad, its nothing compared to the youngsters. The last six year old to win this race was the legendaryFulke Walkywn trained Mill House in 1963. Only two other 6yo’s have won in the history of the race, one of those of course being Golden Miller.

Coming through the betting market to find the next non 6yo or 10yo, we have to go down as far as 5th and 6th favourites, Kempes and Pandorama to find a couple of 8yos. Midnight Chase is nine, and China Rock at 50/1 is the next in line.

So the question is. How strong is age as a gold cup trend, and in 2011, how much influence will it have on your decision of selection?

Can Denman or Kauto Star become the first 11year old to win since Mandarin in 1962?

Can Imperial Commander not only retain the Gold Cup but be the first 10 year old since Cool Dawn?

Will Long Run arrive on the scene and break a near 40 year hoodoo for 6yos?

Or will the racego to a more traditional 7, 8 or 9 year old in the form of Kempes or Pandorama?