Firstly- it was brilliant to catch up with a few of the folks who regularly read this blog. Even nicer was that they all say they actually enjoy reading it. Guys- I hope your punting judgement is better than your reading matter choices and the next 3 paragraphs are the quick catch up with you I didn't have chance to have today.
a) Thanks for your kind words- I hope you have a winner next Tuesday, though I hope your team loses tomorrow!
b) Also thank you for your kind words. But I still won't be top to toeing in a campervan with Kev and now you've met him you've seen why...
c) I'm glad you had a winner with us today (for the first time this year I believe) but we actually wanted all yours to win today so would've liked to have paid you on the lot. See you on the 25th.
My turn to drive today and what I lost, financially, in petrol I gained, psychologically in the absence of listening to Pap FM in Kev's car. For those interested we had radio silence on the way down, in order to discuss the pros and cons of buying into Aintree, and the indie disco on Absolute on the way back.
We arrived to discover the ITV vans squatting in the bookmaker's car park so ended up parking the other side of the pond somewhere near the 4 furlong pole. Much gnashing of teeth as we slogged up the hill. I resolved to have a chat with Ed Chamberlin about it later- preferably on camera.
1) Standard looking book for us in the first- jolly in for the max and Bill Baxter for half. Rest of the field good, solid winners. Bill led but was under early pressure whilst Half Shot and High Moon were cruising- both worth plenty. High Moon went out like a light and Half Shot steadfastly refused to go past despite repeatedly getting alongside. Bill hung on for an unlikely win as Half Shot managed to lose on the nod (unsurprising given his head was vertical for the final furlong), despite hitting about 1/7 in running, and our choice of winners became a losing start.
2) Continuous money for McTigue, Deere Mark and Teddy Blue along with a chunky couple of bets on Leau du Sud gave us 4 bogeys. We barely laid Colonel Mustard- the punters didn't have a clue- and for the 2nd race running we looked set for a lovely win only for it to lose from something as similarly short as Half Shot in the first. Benson was barely a winner and the awful places wiped out the "barely" bit and we were still behind. More of a battle than we hoped.
Away alert. We laid a chunky bet at Donny on a jolly. It hit 40s in running. It won. I sighed.
3) Kev has a gag. When someone asks what the minimum bet is he replies "£100". And then laughs at his own gag. Kev never gets a laugh. Never. Today he did. That may be a portent for the end of the world. And I told that to the lady who laughed- I'm sure she won't do it again. He doesn't need further encouragement. We had 4 max losers in the bottom half of the market (Carcaci Castle, Accidental Rebel, Holy Joe Smoke and The Wounded Knee). None really threatened and we eked out a reasonable win on Nemean Lion bolstered by a great each way result. We nearly had the expenses. Allan told me we were half way there. Neither of us could resist the punchline...
4) Another tale of in running woe. Santos Blue another CairnBet liability that looked beaten that rallied to win with a half max loss for us. Dancewiththewind and Well Eductaed the other losers and another industrial size dose of seconditis.
5) 4 runners and much the same number of bets as the punters deserted us and the ones that did rock up bet The Shunter. It was a pretty uninspiring book with one loser and 3 average winners. The Shunter was never going and Kev got disappointed that the jolly didn't hang on from the fast finishing Empire Steel as it was worth a whole 30 quid more. Until I pointed out that we were a ton worse off in the forecast. Bless. Next door was rather more excited about the result then we were, then Pinno also bounced up, in enthusiastic fashion, to tell me "The Empire Strikes Back". He told me I'd stick that in the blog- I told him he was right. I popped back down to his joint to tell him that the result didn't make much difference to us and there was no extra return for this jedi. Pinno looked disappointed and shuffled off to the betting shop shaking his head morosely.
6) Another jolly that hit a flat spot, looked beaten and rallied to win. And that was our nominal profit gone again. We were losing 55p plus expenses on the day. I should've stayed at home, until the wife told me she'd been watching "Elvis" all afternoon. I had my own version of Heartbreak Hotel going on anyway.
7) We went offline just before we opened for the last and would remain so throughout. It's actually rather fun to do it the old fashioned way, despite me not having actually having done it the old fashioned way as we only started 10 years ago. Anyway, we ended up with a couple of losers (Unit Sixtyfour and Ritson) and finally got a result our biggest win of the day as Bollingerandkrug led all to give us a wage on the day which had looked unlikely but our uninspiring winter run continues.
That's us until Cheltenham where the ultimate roller coaster kicks off. We tend to have a 6:30am alarm and don't get back in until 8:30 in the evening. That means the blogs will be characterised mainly by their brevity. Which is probably a good thing. Until then...
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