Can Lulamba win the Arkle?
“Lulamba’s overall time of 3:53.51 was 5.09s faster than Il Etait Temps in the Tingle Creek an hour later on the card. He reached the mile pole over 8s quicker than Il Etait Temps, approximately 32 lengths ahead. At that pace, he did remarkably well to maintain such a gallop. The final furlong time and run-out speed point to a top class performance, even if we allow for the fact that Il Etait Temps was eased when the race was won”.
If we take the above statement as a working theory to describe this year’s renewal of the Henry VIII Novices’ Chase at Sandown, it perhaps creates the impression that Lulamba won’t be beaten this season, but is that fair? Well the first point to make is that the winning time for the Tingle Creek was around par, ranking 6th of 9 for the most recent renewals of the race where the going has been described as “Good to Soft”. The conditions at Sandown on Saturday may have meant it was on the Soft side of that, but the point that I am trying to make is that the Tingle Creek was not run at a frantic pace, with Il Etait Temps crossing the line with a finishing speed of 103%. That is an important point to make when comparing the 2 races side by side over the course and distance. Lulamba reached the halfway point well ahead of Il Etait Temps, helped by the fact that Be Aware was relatively keen in Harry Skelton’s hands and ran opening splits of 23.13 and 14.89s to get to the front. If anything, that early pace slightly caught Lulamba out and his biggest jumping error in the race came when he pecked on landing after jumping the 1st fence. However, once settled by Nico de Boinville, he jumped fluently and after jumping the first 2 in the back straight, he made a forward move to get alongside Be Aware. Whether that was a deliberate ploy or not, only De Boinville can tell us, but after running the fastest 7th and 8th furlongs in the field (14.41 and 14.77s), he jumped the water on terms and from that point onwards, it was a fairly straight forward success.
A like for like comparison between the 2 winners might suggest that Lulamba was slowing down over the final mile, but when we factor in how far ahead the Novices were at halfway and the difference between the top speed figure (Lulamba 1.64 mph quicker) it tells a different story. Even parking the Tingle Creek comparison for a moment, I think the key point is that under a relatively motionless Nico de Boinville, Lulamba has pulled 9 lengths clear of a pair of horses with ratings in the mid-140s. His time for the final 3 furlongs at Sandown was 46.43s compared to 48.64s for Be Aware and 48.41s for Lump Sum. That’s a fair performance and run-out speed of 27.45 mph was the fastest figure recorded for any horse on the Chase course over the 2 day meeting at Sandown.
There are definitely things that Nicky Henderson’s charge can improve on. His jumping technique is sound, but his back legs do tend to skew to one side when he is in mid-air. That can be worked on. It’s easy to forget that this was just the 6th run of his career and his 2nd over fences. Even the race he won at Exeter had a number of fences omitted due to the low sun in the back straight and so there are plenty of reasons to think that he will be capable of further improvement in his technique with more experience. We have now at least confirmed that Lulamba does possess the speed for the 2 mile trip. The statisticians will argue that a 5-year-old hasn’t won the Arkle since Voy Por Ustedes in 2006 for Alan King and Choc Thornton and he got a 5 lb weight for age allowance. That particular statistic is against Lulamba and I don’t think there is any question that the form of the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle is much stronger than the Triumph. However, I would also argue that the Arkle is not the race it once was. The 2006 Arkle had 14 runners going to post, if we get more than 7 this year it will be a huge surprise to all concerned.
At the time of writing, Lulamba is a general 9/4 chance for the Arkle in the Ante-Post markets. In the modern era, that’s probably a fair price but I think that there is a fair degree of recency bias factored into that. If Kopek des Bordes were to win easily at Leopardstown over Christmas then the market will probably shift again. There is no obvious form line to draw between the 2 and so it’s hard to be sure. With that in mind, patience is probably the key with Lulamba if he is your pick for the Arkle as barring an injury to Willie Mullins Supreme winner, he is likely to be the 2nd favourite on the Tuesday of the festival. However, what we did learn on Saturday is that any doubts over Lulamba having the speed required to win a Grade 1 race over 2 miles can now be dismissed and as such, he is a very lively contender to give Nicky Henderson a record 9th win in the race.