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I am a better jumps student than Flat, but I’ve lost count of how many ‘good’ jumps days were nonsense from a value betting point of view. Then afterwards you find a 16/1 winner in some all-weather rubbish.
As TS Eliot said: April is the cruellest month. A good win after a lean spell is a kind of cruel April: it means the beginning of a misplaced hope. To paraphrase the last page of The Great Gatsby: tomorrow I will really get it right and stuff the bookie harder and faster and really have it away.
But alas, we never do.Some people are lucky punters and some are not. Just as their are lucky men and unlucky men in all other spheres. We’d all like to think we get equal shares from a reservoir of good fortune but it’s not the case. No amount of scientific approaches alters that. Too many times if I got the bet right I got the selection wrong or if I got the selection right I got the bet wrong. Taken with all the other negatives, these things slowly but fatally eat enthusiasm.
A complicated sport predicated on most of its followers losing money hand over fist most of the time is on a sticky wicket in an age of short attention span and instant gratifications.
Four days of Cheltenham is too much.
There is too much training in public. Maybe they should make card declarations: this horse is being trained today.
When a jockey says on television his mount ‘would have a chance’ it almost always means your bet is a dodo. I got in to the habit of finishing the sentence: yes, would have a chance if he was on a winnable mark/with conditions in his favour/not being trained for something else etc.
The Scoop6 is a cynical tax on the stupid which usually pays out to the rich.
The Grand National should be abolished. Otherwise in time it will damage jump racing fatally.
It’s a rich person’s sport financed largely by the poor being ripped off, one way or another.
Wolverhampton is my favourite all-weather track.
Brighton’s a good day out, with great views.
The Classics are overrated, from a betting point of view.
If you say: actually, I won’t have the bet, you will be disappointed a lot less than vice versa.
Hope this helps newbies.
Some people are lucky punters and some are not.
Wrong. Some people are good punters and others are bad. You just happen to be one of the bad ones. You continually moan, berate your luck, cast aspersions on others honesty to make out you are unlucky when the truth is you haven’t a clue.
Some people are lucky punters and some are not. Just as their are lucky men and unlucky men in all other spheres.
Quite, and in words attributed to many people in different spheres including many sportsmen, though attributed originally to Samuel Goldwyn, "The harder I work, the luckier I get!"
Rob
I agree with the OP we are being put away every day by non triers.
I know several old fellows that are much better at reading form than me and have been doing so for years. They don’t use modern technology admittedly, just tried and tested methods that don’t seem to work any more. Strange that this should happen soon after the introduction of the Exchanges, don’t you think?
Prof is also correct inasmuch youngsters today can’t be bothered to back horses in the way I did years ago, which was to put a small Yankee on and then check the results on the radio later. They would much rather buy a scratch card or play online poker. You can tell me that was the wrong way to do it, but that’s what people did, thousands of them, so that the superior intellects could collect with their single bets!I've stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains
I've walked and I crawled on six crooked highwaysQuite, and in words attributed to many people in different spheres including many sportsmen, though attributed originally to Samuel Goldwyn, "The harder I work, the luckier I get!"
Rob
Are you sure? I thought it was Gary Player.
if you’re unlucky as a punter, don’t the exchanges allow you to be lucky as a layer (premium charge excepted) ?
There’s plenty of free competitions on this forum Prof, which you can enjoy the days racing with an interest without having a bet or losing money, who knows you could even win a prize.
Gaelic Warrior Gold Cup Winner 2026
Some people are lucky punters and some are not.
Wrong. Some people are good punters and others are bad. You just happen to be one of the bad ones. You continually moan, berate your luck, cast aspersions on others honesty to make out you are unlucky when the truth is you haven’t a clue.
I think your
opinion
is wrong. I think my
opinion
is right.
You cannot say I haven’t a clue because you don’t know anything about what I’ve done. You don’t like what I have said, it has angered you and you choose to insult me. OK. Just want to be clear you have no basis other than wild hypothesis to say what you’ve said.
Some people are lucky punters and some are not. Just as their are lucky men and unlucky men in all other spheres.
Quite, and in words attributed to many people in different spheres including many sportsmen, though attributed originally to Samuel Goldwyn, "The harder I work, the luckier I get!"
Rob
Eddie Fremantle is fond of quoting that. But his tipping tells another story.
"the good player is always lucky"
capablanca.
I don’t agree with the
opinion
expressed. I know it is not true. Gamblers make many vainglorious statements according to mood.
There’s plenty of free competitions on this forum Prof, which you can enjoy the days racing with an interest without having a bet or losing money, who knows you could even win a prize.
As I’ve said. I’m not giving up because I keep losing money: i am often ahead or even, as well as behind. I’m giving up because I cannot summon the energy to do that, it’s not worth the effort involved even when you’re ahead for a bit. So why would I do it and NOT have a bet?
Quite, and in words attributed to many people in different spheres including many sportsmen, though attributed originally to Samuel Goldwyn, "The harder I work, the luckier I get!"
Rob
Are you sure? I thought it was Gary Player.
Yeats
So did I, but I thought I would checking before quoting. Googling produces numerous sources that suggest the remark was originally made by Samuel Goldwyn.
Rob
Some people are lucky punters and some are not.
Wrong. Some people are good punters and others are bad. You just happen to be one of the bad ones. You continually moan, berate your luck, cast aspersions on others honesty to make out you are unlucky when the truth is you haven’t a clue.
For example, the reactionaries and gentleman punters on this site often get tremendously worked up when people point out that racing contains an unfathomable, un-plumbable depth of concealed information. Every sane person who knows the game to any level knows that is true. No suggestion of criminality is meant by this. Concealed information IS the game itself.
Take racing memoirs. The first thing Charlie Brooks gets out of the way is that when he started training/owning he would sometimes arrive at a racecourse with a horse and find said horse was installed as favourite when he knew full well it had no chance of winning. No wrongdoing is suggested on his part at all. It’s the game. And etc. Yes, perhaps the game must be this way, but one cannot help feeling: a) it probably doesn’t have to be and b) it’s a shabby business in many ways.
Sorry, but that’s myopinion
.
There’s plenty of free competitions on this forum Prof, which you can enjoy the days racing with an interest without having a bet or losing money, who knows you could even win a prize.
As I’ve said. I’m not giving up because I keep losing money: i am often ahead or even, as well as behind. I’m giving up because I cannot summon the energy to do that, it’s not worth the effort involved even when you’re ahead for a bit. So why would I do it and NOT have a bet?
Imo it is clear Prof that you are in it merely for the gamble, and to win money. I would assume that most successful gamblers begin with a love of the game, which grows into a means of making money. If they are successful with small bets here and there they gradually move up until it becomes a source of income. If not, they still have their small bet here and there and love the game. It seems to me that for you the gamble has long since taken over from the love of the game. Therein lies the problem. How can once expect to make a success out of something one is not passionate about?
Perhaps I am wide of the mark in my assumptions Prof, and I apologise if this is the case.
There’s plenty of free competitions on this forum Prof, which you can enjoy the days racing with an interest without having a bet or losing money, who knows you could even win a prize.
As I’ve said. I’m not giving up because I keep losing money: i am often ahead or even, as well as behind. I’m giving up because I cannot summon the energy to do that, it’s not worth the effort involved even when you’re ahead for a bit. So why would I do it and NOT have a bet?
Imo it is clear Prof that you are in it merely for the gamble, and to win money. I would assume that most successful gamblers begin with a love of the game, which grows into a means of making money. If they are successful with small bets here and there they gradually move up until it becomes a source of income. If not, they still have their small bet here and there and love the game. It seems to me that for you the gamble has long since taken over from the love of the game. Therein lies the problem. How can once expect to make a success out of something one is not passionate about?
Perhaps I am wide of the mark in my assumptions Prof, and I apologise if this is the case.
Couldn’t agree more.
The Prof reminds me of my dear old Grandad who almost every week told me "that’s it! I’m giving up – I’m not lucky!". He never did give up of course but then he DID have a love for the game.
If he were still alive though he would be passionately be on the Prof’s side as to whether some people are luckier than others. He used to spend hours studying form and the Sporting Life was his bible. My dad on the other hand was always more intuitive (although he has an incredible memory for placed horses who might run better next time out). The amount of times though that we would all be watching the racing and there would be a close finish between Grandad’s selection and Dad’s selection and almost EVERY time my dad’s would win. I can still see Grandad now shouting and swearing at the TV as we all rolled around laughing at his continued misfortune.
When I first read this thread I thought "why is he bothering to tell us all he is no longer interested in racing – why not just stop posting?" – but then he reminded me of my Grandad so I am glad he did it now!
"this perfect mix of poetry and destruction, this glory of rhythm, power and majesty: the undisputed champion of the world!!!"
When I first read this thread I thought "why is he bothering to tell us all he is no longer interested in racing – why not just stop posting?" – but then he reminded me of my Grandad so I am glad he did it now!
Aw, that’s nice
I’m in Sarajevo (ljubav jedina!) at the moment and whenever I’m over here, I gorge on two foods not readily available in Old Blighty. The first is a local dish called "krompiruša" which is basically potato and onion pie. The second is "prženo seme bundeve" which is quite literally roasted pumpkin seeds.
I adore both but for snacking, I eat sackfuls of the seeds and I eat them with the shell in tact. The seed itself is delicious but the shell is like a pure fibrous coating which is fantastic for cleaning out the intestinal tract. Whenever I return "home", I am satisfied that my prostate is as healthy as any in England.
Now my digestive system is not used to processing them during the first week so for several days, whenever I go to the toilet, I’m usually sat on it for a good half hour at a time spraying out this unpleasant, pungent, mildly irritating, almost perpetual stream of lumpy keister gravy.
That is what this thread reminds me of.
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