GOLF!!

I thought I would re-post this article from an old EVENING STANDARD as I am now taking an interest in betting on GOLF tournaments, but also simply because the article made me laugh.

What happened to 1923's "Worlds most successful men??";

President of the NYSE
RICHARD WHITNEY - RELEASED FROM PRISON TO DIE AT HOME.

Worlds Greatest Wheat speculator
ARTHUR COOGER - DIED ABROAD, PENNILESS.

President of the Bank of International Settlements
LEON FRASER - SHOT HIMSELF

Great Bear of Wall Street
COSABEE LIVERMORE - COMMITTED SUICIDE

Boss of largest steel company
CHARLES SCHWAB - DIED A PAUPER

Head of major Gas corporation
EDWARD HOPSON - WENT INSANE

PGA Golf Champion & Winner of US Open
GENE SARAZEN - PLAYED GOLF UNTIL HE WAS 92, DIED AT THE AGE OF 95, AND WAS FINANCIALLY SECURE AT HIS TIME OF DEATH!!

The moral, Screw work, play Golf

The Druid's Lodge Confederacy: The Gamblers Who Made Racing Pay

When Barney Curley recommends a "Must read" book about gambling I take a definate interest. Unfortunately the book seems to be out of print at present which is unfortunate. Anyway here is the skinny on what occurred!!

Yesterday (3 Oct) marked the 100th anniversary of one of the more spectacular racing coups.

When Hackler's Pride won the Cambridgeshire in 1904 it is estimated his connections, the Druid's Lodge Confederacy, made, in modern terms, more than £10m from their wagers. Ever so slightly more than they had made the year before, when the same horse won the same race.

To win consecutive Cambridgeshires takes some doing. To take the bookmakers for such a monumental ride verges on the epic.

The story is best told by Paul Mathieu in The Druid's Lodge Confederacy - The Gamblers Who Made Racing Pay .

The Confederacy was an eclectic bunch. It was headed by Percy Cunliffe, an Old Etonian gold speculator who weighed in at more than twenty stones and 'was not a man much given to smiling'. The man responsible for 'planking' the money down was Wilfred Bagwell Purefry. Called 'Pure' by his friends, he collected rare orchids, invested heavily in music hall, bred racehorses and was a director of the Autostrop Safety Razor company, a competitor of Gillette.

The funds were fronted by Captain Frank Forester, a dedicated huntsman who was 'a rather terrifying man in the early stages of a run'. And Edward Wigan, a small, extremely uncommunicative man, with a fondness for milk puddings, who pronounced the word coup as 'cowp'.

Another Old Etonian, he was criticised by one of his masters for 'only paying enough attention to turn what I've said into a Spoonerism'. The quintet was made up by the Irish vet Holmer Peard, who bought Sceptre and The Tetrarch and oversaw the trials that the Confederacy ran at their stables at Salisbury Plain.

The planning behind Hackler's Pride's initial campaign was meticulous. After one early impressive run at Hurst Park she was, writes Mathieu, 'run neither openly nor very honestly'. To confuse the bookmakers further, the Confederacy indulged in a pea-and-thimble game by entering three other horses in the Cambridgeshire. This was so successful that when the London clubs started offering odds, Hackler's Pride was available at 25-1.

To say Pure took advantage is an understatement. Employing contacts as various as a Birmingham New Street station-master, a dentist in Woking and a priest, they piled the money down. She started at 9-2 favourite. The race was a formality. 'Almost from the fall of the flag it was a one-horse race. The judge gave it as three lengths. It might have been 33,' was the verdict in the Sporting Luck .

The next year they repeated the dose. Hackler's Pride ran unconvincingly, they played the pea-and-thimble game and then backed Pride down from 100-7 to 7-2 joint favourite. This time it was a closer run thing as the horse won by a neck. Before the race, a stable lad had approached Cunliffe to tell him he had dreamed that Hackler's Pride had won. Cunliffe, unsurprised, replied: 'Indeed. What were second and third?' - buzzle.com

RESULTS SO FAR - 28 JAN 2008

THYESTES H'CAP CHASE

OSCAR INDIA - Balloted out BUT declared for the race, so stake returned.

AIG CHAMPION H'CAP HURDLE

AITMATOV - PU -£200

How disappointing was this horse?? Noel Meade's stable are not firing at all and I read he will not be having any runners for the next few weeks to see if they can discover what the problem is.

Best Odds every race

There are one or two bookmaking firms out there that GUARANTEE the best odds for every race, so who are they and what does this mean??

The way BEST ODDS work is that when you call and place a bet you take the odds on offer at the time of calling.

IF the starting price (sp) is BIGGER than the odds you took, the bet is settled at sp, which gets you round the problem of deciding whether to take a price or not.

For example if you back a horse at 7/2 and the price drifts out to 4/1 at the off, your bet will be settled @ 4/1 if it wins.

One such firm who offer this facility is BET365.

AIG Europe Champion Hurdle

The going in Ireland is going to be the main factor at the weekend and we need a horse that goes on heavy ground.

AITMATOV £100 e/w @ 8/1 with WILLIAM HILL is the one to be with.

Has been backed in from 12/1 and loves soft ground whereas some of the others at the front of the market will not handle it as well.

CHELTENHAM 2008 - ARKLE CHASE

MOON OVER MIAMI - £100 win @ 14/1 with LADBROKE.

The horse has been cut from 20/1 into 14/1 but is still worth a small investment ante-post.

The 2 main rivals appear to be, GLENCOVE MARINA who may run in the Royal & Sun Alliance chase, and TIDAL BAY who is a bit short for an ante-post bet @ 8/1.

newsflash: GLENCOVE MARINA out for the season!!
PEDROBOB also out for remainder of the season - atr 24 Jan :( :(

There is some doubt whether NOLAND @ 12/1 will run or not. His owner after declaring HE WILL NOT RUN at Cheltenham on 21 Jan 2008, seems to have had a change of heart after watching his charge win and jump well @ Folkstone on Monday (21 Jan). It seems he was concerned about the horses jumping as he is only learning his trade, and was worried about the fences at Cheltenham being too challenging.

Only time will tell, but I wouldn't be backing this ante-post!!

LADBROKE have a FREE £10 bet offer for those opening a new account.

BE LUCKY!!

THYESTES HCP CHASE

Winners profile:

Good current form, carrying a light weight.

Only 1 horse in the last 6/7 years has carried >= 11 stone.

Ground will be bottomless so lightweights expected to prevail once again.

OSCAR INDIA 100 E/W @ 20/1

Needs 8 horses to come out, but money back if balloted out.

Trainer thinks the horse is in at a nice weight, 10 stone, and at 25/1 into 20/1 with LADBROKE is a cracking e/w bet (horse part owned by trainers wife).

BE LUCKY!!