SIMON NOTT Betting Blog: Royal Ascot Friday

Despite the bookie-friendly results this week, the on-course teams were going into Friday £55,000 down, thanks to the bigger hitters walloping them on Tuesday.

Flynn, Steve, Lofty and gang managed to get £45,000 back over the last two days with today, traditionally, the real punting day to go – so not over by any means.

Before rapidly rising through the ranks at Star Sports, Flynn was flying high with John Lewis, Gentleman’s outfitters in Oxford Street. That experience was invaluable this morning helping Steve master the fine art of tying a Windsor knot before tackling the punters, though I’m told he’s still better at taking bets.

The first message I got today was from the Star Sports office in Hove, they had laid a whopper, £200,000 at 4/6 Tahiyra in the Coronation Stakes. That augured well for a day where there were some hotpots to get stuck into.

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👑 2:30 – Albany Stakes (Fillies’ Group 3) (Class 1) (2YO only) 6f

There was a decent start to the business on course, though to way more modest figures. Flynn’s team laid £2700 – £600, £1000 – £300 and £900 – £200 on Carla’s Way. Meanwhile, down on the lower Tattersalls rail Lofty’s pitch laid £7500 – £1500 Porta Fortuna to a punter betting in £50 notes.

Lofty added that it was 1-10 it would be the biggest cash bet they lay all day, adding somewhat tongue in cheek, ‘Unless he comes back for a spin-up’.

Many a word spoken in jest Lofty, Frankie Dettori duly did the business for the punter and won the opener with some ease. A spin-up would be nice because the boys down at the bottom, with Chip Shop Steve replacing Charlie, were in it. ‘Done Bollocks’ was Lofty’s message, translated to lost £5000 while Flynn had a rather more upbeat report of winning £1800.

The office did OK though, just OK, they told me ‘Despite it being Frankie, we started the day with a small winning race’.

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👑 3:05 – Commonwealth Cup (Group 1) (British Champions Series) (Class 1) (3YO only) 6f

What’s that noise? It’s the sound of the wheels coming off.

Firstly, Lofty’s computer packed up and had to be replaced. Then an office punter had an even £50,000 Little Big Bear, that’s not the bad news, I’m building up to that. Another punter had a bet of £200,000 – £20,000 each-way Shaquille. At first, it looked a good bet to lay as the colt drifted on the exchanges.

Mind you, if Star hedged into them there’d have been a move the other way. As the stalls opened, it looked an even better bet to lay when the colt missed the break.

The form book will relate that Shaquille’s jockey, Oisin Murphy, rode one of the races of his life to overcome giving the others a head start and hitting 90/1 in running to go on and win the race. Amazing.

Oisin has been writing exclusively for Star Sports this week – check out his daily Royal Ascot blogs and videos: https://www.starsportsbet.co.uk/category/oisin-murphy/

The news was better from Flynn, they’d won £3000 on the race, while Lofty won a carpet because he’d only been able to bet on the race for a couple of minutes. Little Big Bear had been popular in the betting shops with a grand and a couple of monkey bets noted. I didn’t need to ask the office how they did really, so I didn’t. Stoic as ever, they got hold of me anyway and told me that late money for the favourite softened the blow.

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👑 3:40 – Duke Of Edinburgh Stakes (Handicap) (Class 2) (3YO plus) 1m 4f

Flynn reported that they had done over 700 tickets in the first three races, which is busy. The betting on the third wasn’t heavy across the firm, but plentiful. They got a bit more back when 9/1 Okita Soushi won the next under Ryan Moore. Great jockey as he is there doesn’t appear to be the same ‘Frankie Factor’ with Ryan for the non-racing public. In other words, when he wins it’s not always a disaster. Flynn won a modest £300 on the race, the first two home took the book but he got his profit on the places.

Down on the lower rail Lofty’s team got £1800 on the race and were grateful that the runner-up HM President didn’t win as he’d have been much worse and proclaimed that the ‘Comeback has begun’. The office reported that they couldn’t give the winner away so enjoyed a decent race. One of the betting shops laid £15,000 – £2000 Maksud, but also laid the winner but to a tenth of the money.

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👑 4:20 – Coronation Stakes (Fillies’ Group 1) (British Champions Series) (Rnd) (Class 1) (3YO only) 1m

Next up and a hotpot in Tahiyra, which the firm desperately needed beaten. They’d already laid £200,000 at 4/6 and £40,000 – £55,000 the office while the betting shops laid £20,000, £7500, £5000 and £4000 the same horse at the same price, then another £5000 at 8/11. Flynn wasn’t left out, laying £8000 – £11,000 and £4000 – £5500 and £2000 at 8/11 while Lofty chipped in laying a couple of bets at £800 – £1100.

The first message I got after the race, from the betting shop estate, simply read ‘Massacre’. There was a glimmer, OK a 1.02 to keep the race glimmer, of hope as a bing-bong for a Steward’s Enquiry went up around the racecourse. From the luxury of watching on TV, 1.02 looked like a fairly generous price, but you learn from experience that stewards aren’t always as consistent as horses.

It seemed to go on for a while, though, which messed up the betting for the next race. Lofty was frustrated telling me: ‘There’s a sea of top hats in front of us, I mean where are we going to flippin’ well go? Steve and Ricky can’t walk, I’m 22 flippin’ stone, they are just stood in front of the joint.’

The result stands message came with 20 minutes to go before the race, but you struggle to take bets whilst paying out an ocean of punters. The office were calmer with their summing up, ‘In running it never looked in doubt, yes it’s a setback but we will keep laying the big bets.’

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👑 5:00 – Sandringham Stakes (Fillies’ Handicap) (Str) (Class 2) (3YO only) 1m

The race before the penultimate big handicap wasn’t expected to be a high staking betting race, but the teams on course were kept busy. Judging by the totally impossible-to-repeat messages from Lofty, he was starting to get the needle. Flynn is a much more polite F word, he reported bets £10,000 – £400 Dream Of Love and late on £6000 – £1000 Coppice.

Even Flynn could be excused for quietly uttering an expletive when 6/1 joint-favourite Coppice won under Frankie Dettori. His book lost £10,000, Lofty only lost a monkey which he said wasn’t too bad considering the race was won by a national treasure. The word from the office was, ‘Frankie again on a well-backed horse, we’ll take the level book.’

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👑 5:35 – King Edward VII Stakes (Group 2) (Class 1) (3YO only) 1m 4f

It’s not about days or even meetings so the guys have to show the same enthusiasm to keep going and take money after bad reversals as when winning.

The good thing about some punter-friendly results is that they start to think it’s easy. Not such a surprise then that there were bets of £4400 – £4000 a couple of times, and a £1100 – £1000 struck King Of Steel on course. The nearer they got to the off the more that money dried up. Lofty messaged, ‘Shouting 5/4 down here, might as well be shouting it in Esperanto’.

If you are as dim as me and were thinking about googling where Esperanto is, don’t, it’s a made-up language that not many people speak. It was just as well that they don’t as the 5/4 Lofty was shouting looked tremendous value in any language as the favourite showed the rest of the field its backside. It was easy, wasn’t it? Lofty’s team did £3000 which is Tri mil Funtoj in Esperanto and in plain English, Flynn’s pitch lost £10,000.

The office hadn’t given me any bets pre-race and given the drift, I was hoping for the best for them. Sadly no, they came on after the race with a further tale of woe: ‘It doesn’t get any easier all the money for the winner, including bets of £50,000 & £20,000 at evens.’

The betting shops didn’t escape either, they laid bets including £1200 at 11/10 and an even £4000 on the winner.

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👑 6:10 – Palace Of Holyrood House Stakes (Handicap) (Class 2) (3YO only) 5f

It seemed as if most of the punters had decided to keep what they had won on the day in their pockets and ducked the lucky last. There was nothing of note bet-wise on either pitch. Flynn said that they hadn’t taken much and had five losers while Lofty had Conquistador losing £3000.

Rhythm N Hooves won the race under Hollie Doyle and returned 12/1, but had been 16/1. Lofty missed it and copped £1800 on the race but lost £7500 on the day. Flynn’s team won a monkey which meant they ended the day on a winning note but blew £28,000 on the day, on top of that, the team were ‘Feeling battered, bruised and jolly hot’ or words to that effect.

It was hardly surprising that the office were downbeat with their last message, concluding the day, telling me: ‘Well, we finished with a winner, but it was a low turnover race meaning it was still an awful day at HQ’.

Lofty’s fifty-pound note punter from the first never did spin it up, did he? What a shame.

SIMON NOTT

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Views of authors do not necessarily represent views of Star Sports Bookmakers.

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Simon Nott is author of: Skint Mob! Tales from the Betting Ring
available on Kindle CLICK HERE FOR MORE DETAILS

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