Hi all.

It is nice to be back and trying to get som horses ready for the league. Thank goodness for extra upload windows

I managed to churn out some flat horses in a combined UK game in time to upload and race them in the first weeks. Now I try to get some NH horses in before the windows close.

Regarding that, I have som questions I hope you can help me with:

1: I see that most of the NH horses in the league is between 7-9. Is that peak potential time? When do you start trial NH horses, and when do you know a NH horse is competetive and league material?

2: I like to follow the Hunt irl, but still dont get the Novice thing. What kind of horses do you enter as novices?

3: Does gelding the horse have any impact? I know they are geldings irl, but I reckon you keep them as stallions for breeding purposes?

4: Is there a significant difference between combined games or Hunt only? I think I will start flat or hunt only games before the next league in november - my take is that it is easier managed.

Cheers in advance.

Daniel

Nice to have you back Daniel. I'm no expert but i do much better on NH than flat.

1. Yes 7 to 9 is peak. Long distance horses are sometimes still ok at 10. A good one cam perform at 6 but 7 - 9 is optimum. For 4yo hurdlers, who have to be registered as novices, mine are always flat horses. They can jump hurdles ok and there are no chases for 4yo I don't think. So trial your 4yo flat horses over 2m hurdles, no point going above 2m1f really.

2. Novices in SO7 is nothing like real life. As you know in real life it is for young inexperienced horses. Not so in SO7. Some trainers openly admit to putting their best in as novices as there are more G races to clean up. So some of the best horses in the league will be novices. which frankly is silly. That's why i just put one in at each distance. They can run in open handicaps but not open G races.

3. Doesn't seem to have much unless it says may be suited by gelding in the comments. But once gelded you can't breed of course. Another area where reality is lost as i can only remember a handful of entires chasing in the last 50 odd years.

4. I play combined because it gives you best of both worlds and more scope with breeding. I race them on flat at 2,3 and 4. Novice hurdle at 5, hurdle at 6, novice chase at 7, open at 8 and 9, although that can change if something becomes obvious ie not a good hurdler. Also if they are quite clearly NH types i don't persevere with them on the flat and put them aside until old enough for jumping. For speed purposes i would agree an NH only game now but they can be hard to get going I find.

Hope this helps and hopefully someone a bit better at it than me will give you some better advice.

I can't comment on the combine, never played it. If u play jumps only then they are at their best at 8 but the long distance horses 4m plus are best at 9. I wouldn't enter any novices because u taking on the best trainers at level weights, if they are open then they can run in all the h'caps and hunter chases. If u were to play a new jumps then I would concentrate on either a all chase team or an all hurdles game. It takes less time. I never geld my horses before I put them in but i think josh does, not sure if it matters.

Thanks for the advice, really appreciate it. Hope I can gather som hunter chase material before week 6

Regarding novices, guess that topic has been discussed many times. Maybe an age cap should solve it?

The maturity age is game specific, a pure NH game they can go at 7 but it’s rare for me now, but I used to have lines that hit max potential at 7. But the extra year help their jumping. So 8 is peak for most and they can hold that until 9 if you export them early. Combined games peak earlier from 6.

Also don’t know if gelding making any difference but I always geld them and always have, it’s a faff to do mind if you also want to breed them.

Josh