Sir Mark Prescott 8.50 Bath

A lay all day for me.

Is it a cert

Owned by the Ne'er Do Wells VI

Russian Roulette springs to mind

Where does the rating come from ?

Can't see it tbh. Ok dropped to C6 but his form is awful. I might be wrong but Sir Mark doesn't normally campaign them like this does he?

Anyways layed it and backed Galactic Glow.

Why it not running over 2 mile

7 furlong. Last now 1 m 2.....

3 to evens.....now 3 again

I might just green up if it gets to 5/2 and leave the 9/4 Galactic Glow in play. Its not exactly an enthralling race to get involved in.

Half brother was very smart. Reached a rating of 109, won 6 races including a listed and won over 150k in prize money. Off 52 it could be absolutely thrown in.

Can you not just campaign an animal on its merit Prescott. Pathetic really.

Not even fav new

Held up, bumped along 3f out, stayed on, hard held

Won 1 and a half lengths.

Class drop; stepping up three furlongs to the right trip; well-bred. Classic Sir MP Bt.

exactly.
it's by a derby/irish derby winner.
more about the dire opposition than where the celing of this one is at
runs it 5 times over 6/7 furlongs, at least 3 more times than is necessary to get a h'cap mark.
entered up twice next monday -10 and 12 f.

One of a hatful of Ebor darts hat will have this comment added to its race call.

(trainer said, regarding the apparent improvement in form, that gelding appreciated the step up in trip from 7f to 1m4f, which was noted)

*2 times even

the one caveat is that even after he didn't qualify, it still ran like a drain. It still shouldn't have been allocated a mark in my opinion. But it was kept to 7f.

If you're not on the inside it's just guessing either way. Everyone knows the MO and it will likely win races over longer trips, but not necessarily today.

3 yr olds over distance  usually come into their own from now to mid July,Sir Mark usually steps them out over 12 f,so will we have to see if this ones OR is correct.
Villalobos at 16/1 I would rate as the danger

When asked by the stewards for an explanation of the 'apparent' improvement in form, the trainer

replied he he has no explanation. His explanation was noted. Nudge nudge wink wink!

Result

Even Morris in full butcher mode couldn't get him up.

Wossisname commentator calling the hoss Laun sis ton all the way round the track.
'Lawnston' old boy

Cider is right it should not have been given a mark.

I think you will find 3 runs qualify for h/cap mark, h/capper can ask to
See it run one more time, you say it shouldn’t be given a mark?? When would
You have it qualified for h/caps?? He’s been campaigning horses like this for over 30
Years, gets them half ready to run, over trips they cant win, in maidens against quicker
Better horses they can’t beat. Move along now, nothing to see here

If you have a backward 2 year old you would be mad not to run it at 2. Apart from getting the runs for a mark, you get them invaluable experience of going to the races with everything involved.
If you don't and start off in 3 year old maidens, you waste a part of the season running in races you have no chance of winning. There is hardly a maiden without a runner from the bigger stables, finish too close to them and your mark might suffer. It's a no brainer under today's rules.

There's no right to a handicap mark.

Are you trying to claim that it couldn't enter in races that are further than 7f, without a mark ?

In any case, nothing it had done suggested it should be allocated 52. The winner of the race was 47, and had finished in the frame in its last four races. The mark allotted to Launceston was a wet finger in the air.

I wonder what would have become of Sea The Stars, if he'd been sent to SMP?

Would he have turned up in three backend AW maidens over 7f, looking big and backward and absolutely clueless?

Then would he have reappeared in a 0-55 over 10f at Bath towards the end of June, having already been gelded, where he would scramble home by a nose having been heavily backed into 4-9?

Then would he have won his next 6, rising 2 stone in the handicap, before being sold to Graham Wylie for £200K?

But not before the late Alistair Down had told us what a genius and brilliant placer of horses SMP is, who always gets the best out of his horses?

If he gets a really good one he campaigns them along normal lines as Alpinista showed

And he won a French Classic with Confidential Lady.

However, my memory fails me regarding his best 3YO middle distance colts, uptheirons.

Viva Pataca & Time Warp

Cider makes a fair point about not getting a mark and where did 52 come from? On form should've been 46 or whatever the minimum is.
No horse rated that low should be winning a race in the current system with no banded racing (OK, 0-50 classifieds) but I would suggest until a horse shows a semblance of form, the introductory handicap mark should be 70 and then you have a choice to then run it to it's ability to get it down (if it's not a 70 horse already, yes Sir!) or make more effort in its qualifying runs.

A mark of 70

A mark of 70

Apologies, I did post a detailed reply, but
It’s only posting a mark of 70.

Do elaborate! I was suggesting 'if' they wanted to deter 'cheating' they have the means.

to be fair to sir mark it must be an art not only to have slow horses but to get them to look like slow horses,run like slow horses,not as if he has to gun them out front and collapse or hold,m up out the back making ground to late etc, they just look/run slow,slow,slow, even compared to last nights low rated winner who went on the snaff for 9 F before sprinting clear in the grade

That's right, the handicapper is essentially acknowledging that the connections are playing the game, but they are playing along with it, guessing a starting point. It's a game of chicken with connections persisting over a trip too short. The handicapper should wait until there is some discernible form to rate, in my opinion.

Certainly shouldn't allow the horse to be handicapped when the jockey gives the horse a blatant air shot at the furlong pole in its final qualifying run, as Luke Morris did with this horse at Redcar last November.

Would of it improved its position if he sticked it.
It was going backwards at the time, looked like he was
Just pulling his stick through to me

Thrasher had probably already given it 6 whacks with the shelailigh.
His action is ugly pn the eye but he is able to count to 6, to be fair to him.

Strangely enough he never actually touched the horse
In the race, it was 8th at time, and dropping out, no point
In sticking it

Watch the Redcar race, leif. Don't just guess.

Poncho, Morris wasn't pulling the stick through at the furlong pole. He pretended to use it in the normal manner, but missed by two feet. That was the only attempt he made to use the stick in the race.

Hmmmm screaming

Not sure I get you

I give up
It’s only
Posting
15 letter
With the gaps

GEORGE.B -- "I wonder what would have become of Sea The Stars, if he'd been sent to SMP?"

Sir Mark himself said that if you've got an exceptional horse, it will do better with Henry Cecil, but if you have an ordinary horse, it is probably best with Sir Mark Prescott.

Complaints about running over the wrong trip miss the point that for young, slow-maturing, staying horses, the right trip is too far until they are older. It is like expecting a schoolchild to win a marathon.

So either you don't run them at all, or you run them at too short a distance.

Which is why it astonished me so much that he managed to win an Arc.

The horse won the Arc, hé trained it to win the Arc
If the horse has ability, at top end or bottom, hé will
Get the best out of it? Brilliant trainer

Not in my view.  Very, very experienced and successful in his own way, without question, but brilliant?
Henry Cecil.  Vincent O’Brien.  They were brilliant.

Running stayers over an inadequate trip as 2yos isn't the problem, Ramruma. It's stopping the horse over those inadequate trips which causes resentment.

I had a filly who as a 2yo was second in a 6f seller then won one over a mile. She got a mark of 55, and won a Bath handicap off 60 over 2m 1f as a 3yo in August. I remarked to the trainer that he'd done a Mark Prescott with the horse. "But I try with mine" was his reply.

He doesn’t stop a single horse screaming, they are are
Ready to run, they simply don’t have the ability to
Compete over thé trips hé runs them, against the grade
Of horse they run against, usually over those type of
Horses optimum trips, hence that’s how they get their
Ratings? That’s the system, he’s the best at it?

Exactly!  Prescott was known for it for years.

Hé has 80 box’s, he’s full every year, there’s a que, hé
Decides/chooses thé owners, most of his horses are home bred
Staying types, he doesn’t get memass’s, dark angels, star man’s etc
The ones from thé sales are usually staying types too? What do you
Want him to do, run them in back end staying maidens in soft ground
Bump in other sea horses, finish upsides something rated 80, thé horse
Then cant win a h/cap. It then sells to the jumps boys for a fraction of
What he gets, when they have gone from 50 to 90, having run up a
Sequence. That’s one reason he’s full every year??

It's not about the trip. My argument anyway. It's that he hadn't ran well enough in any of the qualifying races to be confident enough to give it a demonstrable mark. So if it's actually that slow, yes it needs to step up so that it can be involved in a race at the business end, and get an evidenced mark. They've probably negotiated the mark but it's wrong. Judged on the little he had achieved before this week, it's way too high.

poncho.. I think any criticism on here is mostly directed at the system not the trainer.

It doesn’t have to run well, it just has to run 3 times, or 4, that’s the
System, thé h/capper is then tasked/obligated to give it a mark
Some of them go on and win over their trip/ground/ability, others don’t
That’s the rules, and hé has to use his experience to h/cap them. Of course
Mr.Prescott, knows more than thé h/capper. They are the rules, and he’s the
Best at exploiting them. What else is hé to do ?? What would you do ??

Roger, I agree, that’s the system, until they change It, hé will
Use the system to the best advantage of horse and owner.

which race did it run to 52 ?

It doesn’t have to run well, it just has to run 3 times, or 4, that’s the
System, thé h/capper is then tasked/obligated to give it a mark

Nimbus Boy has run five times in Ireland for Paul Nolan. In four runs in maiden hurdles between
March 2022 and December 2022, Nimbus Boy was beaten a minimum of 50 lengths, starting at
14/1 on debut and then at odds of 150/1, 200/1 and 250/1 on his three subsequent starts. He ran over
trips between two miles and two miles four furlongs on ground yielding to soft or softer and he
wore blinkers on his fourth start.
After his fourth start, Nimbus Boy was allotted an Irish mark of 85, off which he ran in a handicap
at Punchestown in January over three miles on soft ground, fitted with cheekpieces, starting at 33/1.
Having mainly been patiently ridden previously, Nimbus Boy made the running until the third-last
before dropping away and being beaten 105 lengths.
His Irish mark was dropped 3 lb, to 82.   
Nimbus Boy subsequently joined Samuel Drinkwater and was entered in a handicap hurdle in
Britain.
The handicappers concerned considered Nimbus Boy's runs and declined to give him a BHA
handicap mark, therefore requiring a sixth run back in novice/maiden or other non-handicap
company.
Following that decision, and after following steps 1 and 2 in the handicapping appeals process,
Nimbus Boy's trainer Samuel Drinkwater submitted an appeal to the Handicapping Ombudsman, on
the grounds that a handicap mark should have been given.

afaik there is no right to a mark. if the bha think that they have not seen enough evidence, they don't have to give one. However, I do not know the rules inside out.

So he’s brilliant at “filling his boxes”.  I’ll give him that one.

Declining to allot a handicap mark (or refusals)

Our aim is to provide an initial handicap rating that enables each horse to race competitively in handicaps but without disadvantaging any of its opponents.

Wherever possible, we always try to allot a handicap mark but there are occasions when we have to defer providing a rating. This is usually because we cannot with any satisfactory degree of confidence assess the worth of that horse’s form.

On some occasions when a horse has been declined a handicap mark that horse will be required to run again. In other instances, it may be that we need more certainty over the level of form in a particular race and that subsequent runs of others from that race will provide enough evidence on which to allot a mark.

In conjunction with the National Trainers’ Federation, the BHA has produced the following guide to issues that may prevent a handicap mark being allotted.

This is usually because we cannot with any satisfactory degree of confidence assess the worth of that horse’s form.


Exactly, It's written in their own guidance.

Thanks Cider.  Good info.

Cidre, I think you’ll that’s the exception rather than the rule?
Honch, there’s a reason thé box’s are ful, he’s very good at his job

It's not an exception, the rule applies after the minimum number of qualifying runs for every horse. It will be an exception that a mark is refused. I'm arguing that you could not confidently allot a mark to that horse, and be confidently satisfied you're not 'disadvantaging any of its opponents'.

Well it got 52 and got beat 2 1/2 lengths by an 8 yo
So he probably got that right?didn’t disadvantage anyone??

Vast majority of horses get a mark after 3 run, unless he asks
To see it again?

There goes the nursery https://www.racingpost.com/results/1079/kempton-aw/2025-08-06/899250