FAMOUS BETTING COUPS
Whilst the bookmaker’s floor and race trackside might be littered with used betting slips that failed to pay dividends, history has given the world of sports betting some notable big winners. With internet spread betting becoming even more popular, what are the odds on another big winner in the near future?
Elis (1836 St Leger)
One of the earliest successful horse race betting coups on record was the success of Elis in the 1836 St Leger. Elis’s owner, Lord Bentinck, was one of racing’s great reformers and a fearless punter, and, though those were the days when one had to walk one’s horse to the races as decent roads were few and far between, m’Lud was well aware that bookmakers, knowing that he was based down at Goodwood, would lengthen the horse’s odds and he set about constructing a special carriage to transport Elis up to Doncaster. Bookies happily gave Bentinck 12-1 about Elis, and, pulled by six horses at the rate of 80 miles a day, Elis arrived on Town Moor two days before the race and duly hosed up at 7-2.
Forgive n'Forget (1983 Coral Golden Hurdle Final)
The purists will always associate Forgive n’ Forget as being a Gold Cup winner, but for regular Cheltenham punters his greatest moment came in the 1983 Coral Golden Hurdle Final when he landed owner Tim Kilroe and trainer Jimmy Fitzgerald a massive coup. Despite a field of 23, Forgive n’ Forget was backed off the boards and Mark Dwyer oozed confidence on the 5-2 favourite, waiting until approaching the final flight to deliver his challenge and quickly mastering main market-rival Brunton Park to win by three lengths.
6479/1 Novelty Bet Accumulator (1989)
A 40-year-old night-shift worker from Newport in South Wales walked into his local betting shop on December 30th 1989 and staked £30 on an accumulator, which banked on a series of happenings before the turn of the millennium. The punter’s prayers were with Cliff Richard (4-1) being knighted, U2 (3-1) remaining a pop group, Eastenders (5-1) still being around as a BBC soap opera, and both Neighbours (5-1) and Home Away (8-1) remaining on our British television screens.
Remarkably, all his prayers were answered, and two days into the new millennium he walked back into the shop and asked for his winnings, which amounted to £194,400. Nobody had passed on the bet to head office, but after a couple of days it was confirmed as a bona fide transaction, and the punter was duly paid out, his 6,479-1 accumulator still being the largest novelty “killing” in the history of bookmaking. In the high-stakes world of spread betting, what are the odds on a lucky punter beating this record in years to come?
Destriero (1991 Supreme Novices Hurdle)
Mention the name of Destriero and some bookmakers still wince as they recall one of the greatest gambles of the modern era being landed in the 1991 Supreme Novices’ Hurdle, which traditionally opens the meeting. Irish owner Noel Furlong claims to have netted more than £1m over Destriero, who came to Cheltenham with just the one run over hurdles under his belt – victory at Leopardstown on Boxing Day – and duly delivered by beating subsequent Champion Hurdle winner Granville Again. “We didn’t run him after Christmas as we didn’t want to end up getting 2-1 instead of 6-1,” beamed Furlong as he headed off to the champagne bar afterwards.
Pasternak (1997 Cesarewitch)
On the Flat, the Autumn Double – Cambridgeshire and Cesarewitch – always proves popular with horse race betting aficionados, and one of the great successful plunges for the nine-furlong cavalry charge was with Sir Mark Prescott’s Pasternak in 1997. If not quite on the same scale as Hackler’s Pride, who is reputed to have won his connections the equivalent on modern-day values of around £12m when landing the 1903 Cambridgeshire, Pasternak, who was part-owned by the late Graham Rock, one of the shrewdest judges in the pressroom, is reckoned to have taken an amazing £5m out of the racing betting market.
Rock had told everyone who would listen that they could “have what you like on Pasternak”, and, though he was offered at 11-1 on the morning of the race, The Racing Post’s front page headline “Why you must back Pasternak” captured the punters imagination, and bookies ran out of chalk shortening him up, and he eventually did the business at 4-1.
Istabraq (1998 Champion Hurdle)
Owner JP McManus is not averse to a horse racing bet and he confessed that he “cleaned up” when Istabraq won the first of three Champion Hurdles in 1998. Istabraq has been quoted at 14-1 to become champion after winning the Sun Alliance Hurdle the previous year, but on the day Aidan O’Brien went in print as predicting “he’ll blow them away”, encouraging McManus to put on his betting boots and the 3-1 favourite duly destroyed the opposition with one of the classiest displays of the decade.
Top Cees (1999 Chester Cup)
The infamous Top Cees was one of a string of big-race gambles to come off in the Cesarewitch, but he will always be remembered more for that Chester Cup triumph when he landed some huge bets for Jack and Lynda Ramsden, which led to a High Court case between Kieren Fallon and The Sporting Life, from which the jockey emerged triumphant, having been cleared of any wrong-doings in the horse’s prep-race at Newmarket.
Papillon (2000 Grand National)
Aintree has so many painful memories for some bookmakers, with the 2000 National winner Papillon another name that sends the layers scurrying for the headache tablets. Winning trainer Ted Walsh could barely believe his eyes when he opened his Racing Post on the morning of the race and saw Papillion offered at 33-1, and, with the paper’s influential Pricewise column highlighting the horse, Ted knew that he had to move quick to snap up those odds.
However, accommodated he was, the morning stampede from horse race betting enthusiasts for Papillon was such that when the on-course layers started pricing up the race at lunchtime, the best available was 14-1, and, with the gamble continuing right up to off-time, he eventually went off 10-1 joint second-favourite. It was, as Walsh observed later, a case of “mission accomplished”.
Looks Like Trouble (2000 Cheltenham Gold Cup)
Trainer Noel Chance still has a 50-1 voucher about his 2000 Gold Cup winner Looks Like Trouble, who powered away from Irish favourite Florida Pearl to win chasing’s most coveted crown at 5-2. “He had won the Sun Alliance Chase the previous year, and I thought that 50’s was an insult, so I helped myself and it paid for a new conservatory,” said Chance.
Monty’s Pass (2003 Grand National)
The Irish are renowned for being fearless punters, and Blackpool-born Mike Futter, who owns three bingo halls in Dublin and seven in Northern Ireland, certainly had the leprechauns on his side when he landed a monster gamble with his own horse Monty’s Pass in the 2003 Grand National.
Futter, together with his four co-owners, is reported to have netted £1m plus, with individual horse racing bets of £5,000 each-way at 33-1 and £10,000 each-way at 20-1 “paying for the bubbly”. “I tipped off all my customers, and the Northern Ireland clubs alone raked in £1.3m, but I laid a lot of my own bets off to business partners and by the end of the day only £250,000 went into my own ledger, which is not a bad day’s work,” confessed Futter with a smile.
Denman (2007 Royal & Sun Alliance Chase)
More recently, Harry Findlay is an owner who has had the bookies running scared, and he landed one of the biggest gambles of last jumps season on his own horse Denman in the Royal & Sun Alliance Chase at the Cheltenham Festival. Paul Nicholls is convinced that Denman has the potential to win a Gold Cup one day, and the fearless Findlay said, ”I could not believe that he was not odds-on at Cheltenham, and I went right along the line of rails layers filling my boots. I was still backing him at the off and was amazed that they were offering 6-5 when the tapes went up. Denman is a serious tool, and it was some party afterwards.”
Horse Racing Spread Betting at Sporting Index
