Kelso 3 Feb. Are we still behind closed doors?

Quick update. Don't won't to get political, actually, not going to get political but my MSP advised me last week that I (and, in fact, "we" as an on course bookmaking industry) will not be receiving any support for loss of business over the festive period, despite First Minister saying that businesses affected by lockdown would be supported. Just not ours apparently. In fairness there is little political capital to be gained by supporting the gambling industry in the current climate and Scot Gov can ride the wave of not being Boris which, frankly, is a pretty big and juicy wave to ride. "Could be worse" doesn't help me much with what we've lost but, yep, it could be worse.

Arrived at track around 10:45 to find we were the only bookie there. Mental note to lie in longer next time. We set up in our usual spot at the end of the 2nd line as our colleagues arrived in dribs and drabs. Only 8 books in Tatts and a couple on the rails and, if the hoped for crowd of 1200-1500 arrived, we had a chance of a decent day's business. Weather was clear- hope sprung eternal, especially with the prospect of a crowd "bounce back" from 2 behind closed doors meetings. Sadly the hoped for crowd didn't materialise which was sad for all concerned- the racetrack must've suffered from the effective loss of the last 2 meetings and, I'm sure, would've been hoping for the same bounce as us. We're all feeling the pinch I guess. On to the betting report- bearing in mind how quiet it was please feel free to hit the big X in the top right corner because, as I write, I fear this may very well be as boring as standing behind a stand with no view of the racetrack, taking 30 bets a race. Anyway, here goes.

1:50. We felt Kaizer should've opened favourite. We thought it would be popular, We thought it would probably go off favourite. We felt it would probably win easily. We were right in every respect. A loss in the book no consolation for being right. Would rather have been wrong.

2:20 Three vied for favouritism but only one attracted money on course- Bella Bluesky. And, boy did it attract money. Ginger Mail and Domandlouis appeared to be going better than Bella and it looked like a 50/50 call between the 2- didn't make a lot of difference to us as they were both smallish winners. Based on what we could hear, and the in running prices, it appeared that Domandlouis fell a couple out and brought down Ginger Mail leaving Bella the easy winner. Or "loser" depending on your point of view. We'd laid a couple of chunky-ish bets at 3s early on to, as it turned out, the owners who were there with a wedding. A small consolation being that they were a lovely group of folk and at least we didn't lay the 8s they told us they got earlier in the day.

2:50 We laid them all at various points. We had a pretty tedious book with Upandatit being a small loser and the rest of them winning- Morningside being the only one interesting enough to take note of from our point of view. What a bizarre race. Everything looked the winner at least twice but, of course, our bogey was the one who got up. We passed the Alexander horse box on the by pass on the way to the course; unfortunately the occupant proved to be a little quicker on track. 0-3.

3:20 I'm guessing there must've been some punters on course who didn't back Peterborough but we didn't meet them. And neither did any of our colleagues. Soft lead. Looked the winner after 100 yards- turned out it was, Not great. 0-4

3:50 Top 3 in the market were all similarly popular which really left us with all 3 in much the same position and 2 jackpots one of which was the winner Lalochezia which was nibbled off course but mercifully virtually untouched on. 1-4 but our one jackpot was enough to get us a little ahead on the day.

4:20 Honestly, I don't know what to say here. 1/2 favourite, no real interest from a betting perspective and a messy, messy book that I honestly didn't know what to do with so I didn't really do much which left a small win in the book and a small win overall.

As I've alluded to in earlier blogs we don't play hard at Kelso. We don't think we can based on what we've seen. Our hedges are massively in profit at Kelso and today was another chunk of hedging profit- this is not a good thing. We are not in profit hedging anywhere else- we lose hedging everywhere else. It makes Kelso a unique place for us. We have a minimal liability at Kelso- we don't have massive winners, we don't get killed there either. If I didn't enjoy the place so much it could be pretty boring (from a betting perspective) but the punters are great- kind and knowledgeable. Too knowledgeable at times! And the track is friendly and well run. And we always work next to Bert and his crew who are great fun. And Paul reads this blog which makes him both marvellous and probably masochistic- thanks Paul. And we always get a pen off the legend that is the Mick Walsh team and his even more legendary tin.

So we move on to a double header at Musselburgh and the start of the roller coaster which is the increased liability and the "stand what you take" adventure. Wish us luck. Or don't! Either way it is with a degree of trepidation and equal amounts of excitement that we kick off on Saturday... Or, possibly kick off on Saturday. We've not had rain in Scotland for weeks. It's been quite bizarre really. So, inevitably, there is about 8 hours of torrential rain forecast for the next week; between 10am and 6pm on Saturday along with 40 mph winds. You couldn't make it up. We're not fair weather by any means but there's a lot of relatively expensive electrical kit on course which really needs to stay dry and our attendance will probably depend on whether we can get, and keep, a brolly over it. Cue me standing in my garden at 8am, mush pointed to the heavens, desperately hoping I'm not re-enacting Mary Poppins. If it stays up, doesn't blow inside out and I'm still on terra ferma I'll see you there and next week's betting report might be a bit more of a ride. If not it'll be a photo of the Met Office forecast. Until then, may all your bets be winners, though not necessarily with us!