Racecourse Guide

Ffos Las
National Hunt

Trimsaran, Carmarthenshire · a purpose-built jumps and Flat circuit, opened 2009

⬤ National Hunt
Turf
Left-Handed
Essentially Flat

Shape

Shared Oval same as Flat

Track Type

Essentially Flat slight gradients

Fences

9 per circuit

Hurdles

6 per circuit

Home Straight

3 hurdles 4 fences

Run-in

Short both codes

Direction

Left-handed

Course Highlight

Welsh Gold Cup new for 2026

Also at Ffos Las

Ffos Las also stages Flat turf racing. Read the Flat racecourse guide →

Course Overview

What is Ffos Las like as a jumps track?

Ffos Las’s jumps course is not a separate circuit — it shares exactly the same left-handed oval used for Flat racing, built from scratch on a reclaimed opencast coal mine and opened in 2009. That purpose-built character carries over to the jumps track. At The Races puts the jumps circuit at about a mile and a half with a home straight of just over four furlongs, and records no undulations at all — only a very slight rise through the back straight and the opposite gradient coming home — DrawBias, independently, calls the finish slightly downhill and therefore relatively easy. There is none of the severe topography of older Welsh tracks like Chepstow. The fences themselves draw a consistent verdict, and the strongest voice on them is someone who rode them: Aidan Coleman — 13 Grade 1 winners before a knee injury ended his riding career in April 2024 — whose Racing TV course guide has Ffos Las “designed to be a fair and genuine test for all” with fences that are “well positioned and are well made”. Mick Fitzgerald, quoted below, puts the same thing as “not too stiff, but no pushover”; At The Races has it as “in essence a fair track” while crediting the chase course with “a good test of jumping”, and DrawBias calls the fences “pretty average”. Fair rather than severe, in other words, but not an obstacle course you can ignore.

Each circuit brings 9 fences, including two open ditches (no water jump is used), and 6 hurdles split evenly between the back and home straights — four of those fences and three of those hurdles stand in the home straight. Both codes finish with a relatively short run-in, and At The Races notes that field sizes here tend to be small. It’s a young track by any measure, and its National Hunt identity is still being written — but it already has one genuinely distinctive statistical fingerprint, and it belongs to handicap chases rather than to the track as a whole.

The Chase & Hurdles Course

Circuit Shares the Flat course exactly — the same left-handed oval, with no separate jumps circuit
Fences 9 per circuit, including two open ditches; no water jump. Four of them stand in the home straight
Hurdles 6 per circuit, split evenly between the back and home straights — the three in the home straight are the ones taken out when the sun is low
Character Aidan Coleman rated the fences “well positioned and… well made” on a track “designed to be a fair and genuine test”; At The Races still credits the chase course with “a good test of jumping” — fair rather than severe, which is not the same as undemanding

Race-day checks

Obstacles come out This is a standing feature of the track, not a freak: Aidan Coleman’s course guide says the hurdles track “can often be at risk of low sun up the home straight and tend to get omitted at certain times of the year”. It shows up in the results — on 21 April 2026 the three home-straight hurdles were omitted for low sun, and in a June 2014 chase all four home-straight fences and a back-straight open ditch went (both Racing Post race notes). Fewer flights or fences late changes the jumping test, so read the race notes before betting a jumping angle
Winter ground Fitzgerald’s warning below is the one to hold on to — when it turns properly soft here it becomes really hard work, a different test from the same course on decent ground. Coleman goes further on what wins in it: Ffos Las “lies in one of the wettest parts of the country, so conditions get very extreme in the winter and heavy ground specialists tend to excel here”
Small fields At The Races notes that jumps field sizes here tend to be small, which is worth remembering before reading much into how any one race was run

I walked the course at Ffos Las on the day it opened for racing and there’s no doubt about it – it’s a beautiful set-up, you can’t help being impressed. I don’t think it gets the backing from some people that it deserves, because all the current jocks – Flat and jumps – say good things about it. The jumping lads reckon the fences are a fair test – not too stiff, but no pushover – and it’s grand to ride. The one worry about it is that the going can become extreme. When it gets properly soft, it can be really hard work.Mick Fitzgerald, former top jump jockey — At The Races

Notable Races

When does Ffos Las race?

Class 3 Handicap Chase · new for 2026

Welsh Gold Cup

The racecourse called the running on 16 March 2026 the inaugural Welsh Gold Cup: a Class 3 staying handicap chase over 2m7f177y for a £17,500 fund, won by Big City Roller. One running does not make a fixture, so treat the March date as provisional until it repeats.

Staying Handicap Chase · spring

West Wales National

The course’s long-standing staying chase, and a spring race rather than an October one: Class 3 over 3m3f208y on 31 March 2024 (Art Decco), Class 3 over 2m7f177y on 21 March 2025 (Top Of The Bill). No 2026 renewal under that name has been traced. Both the distance and the title have moved in recent seasons, so check the current programme rather than assuming either.

Moved away · 2025

Welsh Champion Hurdle

No longer run here. Ffos Las staged it until 13 October 2024 — a Class 2 Limited Handicap over 1m7f182y, won by Lump Sum for Sam Thomas — and it returned to Chepstow in 2025. The 2026 renewal is set for Chepstow on 11 October. It is still a Class 2 Limited Handicap there, not a Graded or Listed race.

Pace Bias

What the pace figures actually say

Ffos Las carries one of the rarest run-style fingerprints in British jump racing — but it belongs to one kind of race, not to the whole track. Geegeez’s study of UK handicap chases with seven or more runners, covering 1 January 2017 to 6 October 2024, found front-runners holding an edge at nearly every course and trip; two tracks bucked it outright, and Ffos Las was one of them, alongside Bangor. The study splits the racing into four distance bands, and Ffos Las lands on the wrong side of the front-running ledger in three of them — 2m1f and shorter, 2m3f–2m4f and 2m5f–2m6f — while it is not named among the strugglers at 2m7f–3m2f. A short aside on 2m2f covers just 86 races across five qualifying tracks and names none of them but Kempton.

Do not carry that across to hurdles. The same author’s handicap-hurdle study (UK, eight or more runners, 2009 to July 2021) lists Ffos Las over 2m among the course-and-trip combinations where front-runners returned an A/E above 1.50 — the opposite reading, at the same short trip where the chase figures run against them. Pace here is a race-type question, not a track-wide rule.

Hold-up horses — UK & Irish handicaps, 6+ runners, both codes

Ffos Las hold-up

10%+ — one of three tracks

UK/IRE hold-up average

7.25% baseline

UK/IRE front-runner average

14.91% — the national norm

Read the scope before the shape. Those three figures come from a 2021 study of 33,738 UK and Irish handicaps with six or more runners — Flat and jumps together, not Ffos Las jumps racing on its own. Ffos Las was one of three tracks in it where hold-up horses won 10% or more. But the same study also found that no course in those five years produced a level-stakes profit for hold-up runners, and that the best hold-up A/E anywhere was 0.97, at Yarmouth. Hold-up horses winning more often here is not the same thing as hold-up horses being underpriced here.

So the usable angle is narrower than the headline: in a qualifying handicap chase, do not assume the leader carries the usual advantage, and read the pace map accordingly. Over hurdles, work it out race by race.

Statistics · Since 2010

Which trainers and jockeys win most at Ffos Las?

Trainer	Runs	Wins	Win%	Places	Place%	A/E	P/L
1 Williams, Evan	1231	150	12.19%	348	28.27%	0.85	-213.16
2 Bowen, Peter / Michael	837	123	14.70%	282	33.69%	0.96	-214.73
3 Curtis, Miss Rebecca	470	98	20.85%	212	45.11%	0.97	-52.13
4 Twiston-Davies, N A	395	75	18.99%	157	39.75%	0.96	-37.52
5 Pipe, D E	370	62	16.76%	136	36.76%	0.89	-49.31
6 Vaughan, Tim	578	59	10.21%	156	26.99%	0.70	-236.69
7 Henderson, N J	150	55	36.67%	76	50.67%	1.13	+37.49
8 O’Neill, Jonjo and AJ	354	54	15.25%	129	36.44%	0.83	-11.84
9 Hobbs, P J / White, J	205	33	16.10%	75	36.59%	0.85	-54.44
10 Rees, D A	281	32	11.39%	74	26.33%	1.01	+50.13
11 Williams, Miss Venetia	178	30	16.85%	65	36.52%	0.97	+5.67
12 Honeyball, A J	156	30	19.23%	64	41.03%	0.81	-25.97
13 Mulholland, N P	243	27	11.11%	77	31.69%	0.80	-11.27
14 Snowden, Jamie	110	27	24.55%	48	43.64%	1.19	+15.09
15 Pauling, Ben	94	25	26.60%	47	50.00%	1.22	+46.78
16 Bailey, K C	134	24	17.91%	54	40.30%	0.96	-23.04
17 Nicholls, P F	94	24	25.53%	42	44.68%	0.97	-3.19
18 Llewellyn, B J	274	23	8.39%	71	25.91%	0.85	-42.23
19 Greatrex, W J	161	23	14.29%	55	34.16%	0.74	-73.47
20 Murphy, Olly	87	23	26.44%	37	42.53%	1.06	+11.79

Ffos Las NH, since 2010. The two big Welsh yards dominate the winner counts and both lose heavily — Evan Williams 150 winners but A/E 0.85 and £213.16 down, the Peter and Michael Bowen yard 123 at A/E 0.96 and £214.73 down. Rebecca Curtis (A/E 0.97) and Nigel Twiston-Davies (0.96) are closer to fair. Ben Pauling has beaten his prices from a shorter book — A/E 1.22 and +£46.78 from 94 runners — and below the table B J Eckley has returned +£77.73 from 48 at 1.58. Christian Williams has fallen furthest short of his: 163 Ffos Las runners at A/E 0.42, the weakest figure of any yard with 100 or more runners here, with Tim Vaughan next (578 runners, A/E 0.70, £236.69 down). Three of these yards have changed licence since the sample was built: Mickey Bowen took sole charge in May 2025, Nigel and Willy Twiston-Davies took a joint licence the same month, and Kim Bailey has trained on a joint licence with Mat Nicholls since 1 January 2025. Read those rows as the yard’s record rather than one person’s. Figures pulled 26 July 2026.
ffos-las NH · Current trainers, since 2010

Jockey	Runs	Wins	Win%	Places	Place%	A/E	P/L
1 Bowen, Sean P	499	104	20.84%	199	39.88%	1.03	-16.68
2 Wedge, Adam	530	75	14.15%	162	30.57%	0.96	-35.99
3 Twiston-Davies, Sam	420	70	16.67%	161	38.33%	0.84	-91.14
4 Sheehan, Gavin	180	40	22.22%	71	39.44%	1.11	-4.33
5 Jones, Ben R	215	36	16.74%	73	33.95%	1.04	-57.27
6 Bowen, James C	250	27	10.80%	77	30.80%	0.66	-82.80
7 Bass, David	107	25	23.36%	41	38.32%	1.15	+24.38
8 Tudor, Jack	165	20	12.12%	39	23.64%	0.93	-57.00
9 Boinville, Nico	63	20	31.75%	27	42.86%	1.26	+28.57
10 Williams, Isabel	156	19	12.18%	46	29.49%	0.83	-11.37
11 McLernon, R P	152	18	11.84%	44	28.95%	0.87	-65.76
12 Ring, C V	246	16	6.50%	48	19.51%	0.73	-135.06
13 Deutsch, Charlie	106	16	15.09%	45	42.45%	0.91	+14.04
14 Cobden, Harry	88	16	18.18%	35	39.77%	0.82	-16.55
15 Nolan, Michael G	87	16	18.39%	33	37.93%	1.27	+21.01
16 Bellamy, Tom	106	14	13.21%	31	29.25%	1.00	-31.88
17 Skelton, Harry	77	14	18.18%	36	46.75%	0.66	-18.97
18 Powell, Brendan	126	13	10.32%	43	34.13%	0.75	-32.89
19 Dunne, R T	153	12	7.84%	28	18.30%	0.75	-65.69

Ffos Las NH, since 2010. Sean Bowen dominates the winner count — 104 from 499 at 20.84% — and his A/E of 1.03 means those runners won at about the rate their prices implied — with Gavin Sheehan above fair at 1.11. Adam Wedge is the local rider on volume at A/E 0.96. Sam Twiston-Davies has come up shortest of the visiting regulars at A/E 0.84. Two riders in the table have beaten their prices on smaller books — Michael G Nolan +£21.01 from 87 rides at A/E 1.27 and Nico de Boinville +£28.57 from 63 at 1.26. Below the table, David G Noonan has returned A/E 0.48 from 160 rides; James C Bowen sits in it at 0.66 from 250. Figures pulled 26 July 2026.
ffos-las NH · Current riders, since 2010

Sire Statistics · Since 2010

Which sires do best at Ffos Las?

Sire	Runs	Wins	Win%	Places	Place%	A/E	P/L
1 Milan	348	41	11.78%	111	31.90%	0.78	-132.44
2 Oscar (IRE)	273	41	15.02%	82	30.04%	0.86	-67.84
3 Kayf Tara	266	40	15.04%	107	40.23%	0.89	-36.47
4 Presenting	210	37	17.62%	73	34.76%	1.04	-24.64
5 Flemensfirth (USA)	290	36	12.41%	91	31.38%	0.67	-124.91
6 Westerner	203	30	14.78%	72	35.47%	0.87	-37.64
7 King’s Theatre (IRE)	187	30	16.04%	71	37.97%	0.87	-28.70
8 Getaway (GER)	204	29	14.22%	67	32.84%	0.96	-37.37
9 Beneficial	224	28	12.50%	74	33.04%	0.77	-76.75
10 Midnight Legend	143	27	18.88%	53	37.06%	1.07	-29.02
11 Mahler	155	26	16.77%	52	33.55%	1.04	+16.99
12 Old Vic	134	20	14.93%	49	36.57%	0.81	-2.94
13 Dr Massini (IRE)	131	19	14.50%	37	28.24%	1.15	+19.45
14 Black Sam Bellamy (IRE)	123	17	13.82%	40	32.52%	0.81	-29.52
15 Alflora (IRE)	121	16	13.22%	39	32.23%	0.92	-27.94
16 Shantou (USA)	109	16	14.68%	34	31.19%	0.88	-48.16
17 Walk In The Park (IRE)	103	16	15.53%	36	34.95%	1.03	+90.28
18 Definite Article	91	16	17.58%	28	30.77%	1.03	-28.57
19 Robin Des Champs (FR)	80	16	20.00%	25	31.25%	1.09	+3.03
20 Brian Boru	65	16	24.62%	24	36.92%	1.46	+19.38

Ffos Las NH, since 2010. Presenting is the only sire with 200 or more runners here at or above fair price (17.62% from 210, A/E 1.04), which is itself unusual. Milan leads the winners jointly but returns A/E 0.78 for a £132.44 deficit, and Flemensfirth has fallen furthest short of its prices — 290 runners, A/E 0.67 and £124.91 of losses. Beneficial (224, A/E 0.77) also loses meaningfully. The strongest figures sit on shorter books: Bach has returned A/E 1.50 from 52 runners, Brian Boru 1.46 from 65 and Vinnie Roe 1.45 from 51. All three are stamina influences and Ffos Las can be a stamina test in midwinter, but this table covers every going, so it cannot show that the ground is what produced those figures. Figures pulled 26 July 2026.
ffos-las NH · Since 2010

How to read these tables. The figures are a first-party pull for this course and code covering runs since 1 January 2010, taken as a snapshot rather than updated live. A/E compares actual wins with the wins implied by starting price, so a figure above 1.00 means the group has won more often than its SP suggested. P/L is profit or loss to £1 win stakes at starting price.

Insider Knowledge

Betting Angles

🎯

Don’t Assume the Leader Has the Usual Edge

In UK handicap chases of seven or more runners between January 2017 and October 2024, Ffos Las is one of only two tracks — with Bangor — where front-runners were at a disadvantage overall. That is a reason to read the pace map closely in those races. It is not a reason to prefer hold-up horses blind: in the mixed-code handicap study that supplies the 10% figure, no course returned a level-stakes profit for them.

📉

Chases and Hurdles Point Opposite Ways at Two Miles

The chase study has Ffos Las against front-runners at 2m1f and shorter. The same author’s handicap-hurdle work has Ffos Las over 2m among the course-and-trip combinations where front-runners returned an A/E above 1.50. Same trip, opposite reading — so settle which code you are in before you use either.

🏆

The Bowen Yard Is the Closer of the Big Two to Fair

123 winners from 837 runners here since 2010 at A/E 0.96 — a shade under what its prices implied, and the better of the two big Welsh yards on that measure, with Evan Williams at 0.85 off an even deeper book. Peter Bowen handed the licence to Mickey Bowen in May 2025, so the row is the yard’s record rather than one man’s.

📈

Pauling and Snowden Have Beaten Their Prices Here

Since 2010, Ben Pauling’s Ffos Las runners have returned A/E 1.22 and +£46.78 from 94, Jamie Snowden 1.19 and +£15.09 from 110 — both above what their starting prices implied. Tim Vaughan (0.70 from 578), W J Greatrex (0.74) and N P Mulholland (0.80) have come up short of theirs. Those are past results at one course, not a standing edge — worth a second look when the horse and the race also appeal.

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

Evan Williams Has the Deepest Book, Not the Best Record

1,231 runners and 150 winners here since 2010, comfortably the biggest footprint of any yard — but A/E 0.85 and £213.16 down to level stakes. That means his runners have won less often than their starting prices implied, which is the opposite of the market rating him fairly.

🐎

Dr Massini and Brian Boru Have Beaten Their Prices

Milan tops the sire list on winners at A/E 0.78 and £132.44 down. Dr Massini (IRE) has returned 1.15 and +£19.45 from 131 runners and Brian Boru 1.46 and +£19.38 from 65 — chosen ahead of Bach (1.50 from 52) and Vinnie Roe (1.45 from 51) because their books are the deepest of that group, not because their figures are the highest. Flemensfirth (USA) at 0.67 and Beneficial at 0.77 have fallen well short of theirs.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Assuming front-runners hold their usual edge in a Ffos Las handicap chase. In UK handicap chases of seven or more runners between January 2017 and October 2024 this is one of only two tracks where they did not. The same does not hold over hurdles, where the 2m figures run the other way.
Looking for the Welsh Champion Hurdle here. It left after October 2024 and has been run at Chepstow since 2025, where it is still a Class 2 Limited Handicap rather than the Listed race it was at Chepstow in the 1980s.
Reading the fences as either extreme. They are rated “pretty average” and this is not Chepstow, so a horse does not need to be an exceptional jumper to act here — but At The Races still credits the chase course with “a good test of jumping”, so a suspect jumper is not absolved by the track being fair.

Common Questions

Ffos Las Racecourse FAQs

Is there a pace bias at Ffos Las?

Yes, but it is race-type specific. In UK handicap chases with seven or more runners between January 2017 and October 2024, Ffos Las is one of only two tracks — with Bangor — where front-runners were at a disadvantage overall. Over hurdles it runs the other way: the same author’s handicap-hurdle study puts Ffos Las at 2m among the course-and-trip combinations where front-runners returned an A/E above 1.50. Settle which code you are in before you use either figure.

Is the Welsh Champion Hurdle still run at Ffos Las?

No. Ffos Las staged it until 13 October 2024 and the race returned to Chepstow in 2025; the 2026 renewal is scheduled for Chepstow on 11 October. It was never a Graded race in its Ffos Las years — it ran as a Class 2 Limited Handicap Hurdle, and it stayed Class 2 on its return to Chepstow, having held Listed status at Chepstow in the 1980s. The 2010/2011 muddle has an answer: Ffos Las was due to stage the revival in January 2010, but the meeting was abandoned in frost and snow and was not rescheduled because the race carried no British Pattern status and so would draw no extra funding (RTE, 11 January 2010). The first completed Ffos Las running was in 2011. That is why the course’s own history calls 2011 the revival while Chepstow dates the Ffos Las era from 2010.

Are Ffos Las’s fences difficult?

Not especially. Aidan Coleman, who rode here, described a track “designed to be a fair and genuine test for all” with fences “well positioned and… well made”, and there is none of the severe topography of a Chepstow. At The Races does still credit the chase course with “a good test of jumping”, though, so fair is not the same as undemanding.

Is the jumps course separate from the Flat course at Ffos Las?

No, they share exactly the same left-handed oval. Ffos Las does not have a distinct jumps circuit.

Explore

Other Jumps Tracks

Chepstow

Left-handed, severely undulating — home of the Coral Welsh Grand National.

Aintree

Home of the Grand National — Mildmay and National courses.

Cheltenham

Old Course and New Course — the home of jump racing.

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