Welcome back to The Notebook, a weekly column looking ahead to the National Hunt season for 2026-2027 and providing you with some statistical insight, along with a horse for you to follow and their potential race target.

Owen Improves Them Like Nobody Else

This week, I am taking a look at some of the RaceWatch data around trainers and how their runners improve from their first run to their second. This should help you identify some betting angles for the early part of the season, specifically runners from one training operation. There is one standout trainer when it comes to improving horses for their second outing of the season, so the man in focus this week is possibly the best dual-purpose trainer in the game, James Owen.

The data shows that Owen operated at a strike rate of 22.3% last season, which alone is positive, but there is a stark disparity between how horses perform from their first run to their second. Owen’s runners got their head in front in 17.8% of their first runs of the season, which, again, is far from awful, but it’s the improvement that his runners show on their second starts that is most interesting. The strike rate for horses having that second outing jumps to 28.1%, giving the yard a double-figure percentage-point increase, with over 1 in 4 runners going on to win when having their second start.

In addition to this, we may be about to enter a purple patch for the yard based on last year’s data. In September 2025, Owen and his team were firing at a huge 50% strike rate for that given month, and it’s not as if the sample size is small. They sent out 28 runners to the track, with 14 of them going on to win.

Now, this hasn’t materialised yet in 2026, which leads me to think that the stable may be a little behind last year, but the tide could be turning, with 3 winners and 8 placed horses in the last 7 days. Although his strike rate wouldn’t overly excite you, context needs to be applied, with 16 of his runners going off at double-figure odds in the last week, so they were not exactly fancied.

If I’m correct in my assumption that the yard is a few weeks behind this year, then the next few weeks, as we move into October and the start of the Jumps season, could be far more fruitful for the team at Green Ridge Stables and punters who follow them.

 

Horse: Hamlets Night

One of the runners who has won in recent weeks is an interesting contender for the Welsh Champion Hurdle, and the yard has confirmed that this will be the next engagement for Hamlets Night.

A winner on the Flat 7 days ago when sent off at odds of 7/1 at Yarmouth, he’ll likely be getting weight in the Welsh Champion Hurdle from most of the field, which makes him an interesting runner, especially when you look back at his form from last season.

Hamlets Night was second at Cheltenham at the October meeting, where he went down by just a neck to Give It To Me OJ. They raced off level weights, and the winner is now rated 138, with Hamlets Night on a mark of 128. But the suggestion that he’s well in based on official figures doesn’t stop there, as his next outing was to Wincanton for the Grade 2 Elite Hurdle, when, again, the margin of defeat was agonisingly close. Rubaud beat him, again by a neck, when giving Hamlets Night 6lb in weight, but even so, the Nicholls runner is rated 145.

Hamlets Night was a little disappointing towards the back end of the season, but that could be forgiven when you see that between April 2025 and April 2026, he competed in 16 races across both codes. That’s a lot of racing in just one 12-month period!

He’s only 5 years old and could have plenty more improvement over obstacles, and with him clearly being well in at the weights, along with the potential for the yard to start firing on all cylinders, he’s a horse who has to go into The Notebook for the start of this season.

Summary

Keep James Owen’s runners on your radar this coming season, especially when they are second time out, as the improvement that he gets from his horses is unrivalled. Additionally, get Hamlets Night into your notebook and, although you’d need to analyse all the variables and opposition following entry stage, I’d still stick a big red circle on the calendar around the date of Sunday 11th October.

The Notebook:

Week 1: Emid’io Pepe

Week 2: Nathannah

Week 3: Hamlets Night