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Saturday Racing

29/6/2013

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My half year review is going to make sober reading. 

Last chance to make headway:

2:55 Newmarket  I'm Your Man 9/1
3:15 Newcastle   Moidore 9/1
3:30 Newmarket  Producer  10/3
6:30 Curragh      Sugar Boy 9/1




     
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Ascot Saturday

22/6/2013

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Couldn't even get the right day in yesterday's title, let alone the right horse over the line first. At least Johnny Murtagh was concentrating.  


Doubles:
3:05 Ascot   Sir John Hackwood  8/1
3:45 Ascot   Mince  14/1
4:25 Ascot   Duke of Firenze 8/1
5:00 Ascot   Beaumont's Party  18/1
5:35 Ascot   Cul Baire  14/1



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Ascot Thursday

21/6/2013

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My cat was run over Wednesday morning. 6 years ago we flooded on the equivalent day of Ascot. 

I was thinking of this because, in hindsight, the flood was the start of the end for my professional gambling career. It sent me out of kilter, and I was too slow to recognise this. My standard bet was the highest it had ever been and the subsequent losing run was to damage me below the waterline, both betting bank and mentally. By the time I recovered I was left with scared money and a long, slow endgame.

With that in mind, I'm going to aim for some circumspection and try not to let the cat's death presage the end of my "part-time portfolio betting". So this page may be quiet for a while. 

That said, I can't help noticing that Johnny Murtagh has a very interesting book of rides, all of them at double-figure odds.  I think I'll start there for today...

    
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Ascot Thursday

20/6/2013

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You know your luck is at its lowest when you're woken in the morning by a dog walker telling you your cat has just been run over. 

Can't be much bothered with the racing. Certainly not the blogging about it.
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Ascot Wednesday

19/6/2013

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I have to back Prince of Johanne today. He won for me last year, conferring bragging rights over the group who were there that day and who has asked me for a tipping sheet. Not a good reason granted. Still, he's on the same mark, has had an identical prep and the conditions suit ideally. Would normally want at least 16/1, first 5 places, for each way betting, but will settle for 14s.

Want to hit one out of the ball park - how about Jammy Guest at 80/1 ew in the Jersey? Absolutely no reason to run in this, on a nice handicap mark. Margarson is either indulging an owner, or thinks he has a decent one. Worth a few quid to find out surely.

I'll back these as well, and in doubles.

2:30  Music Master 14/1+
3:05  Dank 9/2
3:45  Maxios 11/2
4:25  Prince of Johanne 14/1


    
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Ascot Tuesday

18/6/2013

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Not sure I have a bet today - and Tuesday at Ascot has historically been awful for me.

Like the Hamdan horses in the slowcoach marathon. 

Doubles.
2:30   Trade Storm 12/1
3:05   Reckless Abandon 11/2
3:45   Toronado  9/2
4:20   Riverboat Springs 10/1
 
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Saturday Gambling

15/6/2013

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I'll take my empty post last week as a metaphor...

Simple doubles this week, with a dodgy weather forecast and Ascot on the horizon. 

2:20 Sandown  Bancnuanaheireann  12/1
2:40 York         Fort Belvedere 11/1
2:55 Sandown  March 8/1
3:15 York         Baltic Knight 7/2
3:35 Muss        Ubetterbegood 20/1



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Saturday Gambling

8/6/2013

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Hubris

5/6/2013

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When I was a full-time gambler, I liked to think of myself as rational and objective; that I was calmly punishing the mistakes of inferior market makers and spanking the arse of deep-rooted market inefficiencies. At the very same time, I was a gibbering mass of neuroses and red wine stains, desperate to keep the gambling gods on my side.

There's an old truism about gambling: When you're losing you're never as bad as you think you are, and when you're winning you're never as good as you think you are.

And it was when I was winning that I was on red alert for any hubristic comments that made it sound like I'd got the game cracked. No matter how provable my edge may have been, it was critical to act as though it was the gods who had decided to grant me my own pay-window. And that I acknowledged they could take it back at any time if I ever suggested my success was down to myself.

I actually went a little mad trying to appease the gods. I took to seeing people on the streets of London as their agents. Beggars, Big Issue sellers, anyone similar were like choric characters on my gambling journey. If I didn't give them a pound, my head would say “the gambling gods were watching”. I often had to turn around and walk a mile back to someone I'd ignored. It got so bad that I couldn't leave the house without a pocket bulging full of pound coins. Not forgetting that it cost me a fortune. When I moved to Shropshire there weren't any beggars. So I stopped. And so did my gambling success. Almost overnight.

I write this because part of me feels like I've been responsible for a terrible act of hubris, for which someone else has been punished. And part of me thinks it's doubly inexcusable because my gambling experiences should have alerted me to the consequences. (See Writing area of this blog for more details).    

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Saturday racing

1/6/2013

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I have a nice place double running onto Festive Cheer at 50/1, and most the others covered against the favourite, so that's the Derby covered.

It's a hopeless card otherwise so I'll stick to doubles:

1:35 High Troja  9/2
3:15 Long Awaited 8/1
4:00 Ocovango 9/1
4:50 Duke of Clarence 4/1
5:25 Gabbiano  15/2+



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    Gambling

    Notes every Saturday on that day's racing and how well or badly I've done the previous week. 

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