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Friday, 25 May 2007 |
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By Patrick Hagan of the DAILY SCHTW
It’s inevitable! Every time you go to a race track or simulcast facility, you always hear about one. What am I talking about, you ask? A tip.
I’m not talking about a tip in a gratuitous sense when you are at a fine dining establishment. A tip at the track basically translates to information on a horse that cannot lose. On a recent Sunday afternoon, I was at my usual spot in the clubhouse at Hollywood Park when a friend of mine came up to me. We engaged in some small talk and he told me about a tip he received on a mare in the 6th race at Golden Gate that afternoon. The race in which the mare was entered was a $4,000 claiming event for older fillies and mares. The $4,000 claiming level is the lowest class level on the Northern California circuit. It translates into a level with the most “physically-challenged” horses on the grounds. The field consisted of fillies and mares that had won multiple races. The mare my friend told me about had only won one race in her career. Recently she had competing in races against fillies and mares that also had just one career win. She was competing against much tougher rivals who were multiple winners, unlike the weaker company she had been keeping with one time winners. I perused my past performances and told my friend that the mare was overmatched and has no chance to win. As the 6th race of the afternoon at Golden Gate Fields was approaching, I was formulating my bets. I liked the favorite in the race at odds of 3/2 and was standing in line when low and behold the owner of the mare on which I received the tip was in another line betting big money and presumably on his mare. I stood to my conviction and bet on the mare who I liked breaking from the 1 hole. In years past, that wouldn’t have been the case. I was a sucker for “easy money”. My mare rewarded my beliefs and won the race by a clear margin. As for the “tip horse”, she finished second and well behind the winner. My friend came up to me after the race and said, “I wish I listened to you instead of the guy who gave me the tip.” The funny thing is, the person who gave my friend the tip was the owner of the “tip” mare . In over 20 years that I have been attending the races, I have been given numerous “tips”. The majority of them have come up on the losing end. When I started in this game, I would sometimes wager on them, thinking that it was “free money”. Guess what? Most of the time it translated into “losing money”. My advice to everyone is: stick to your convictions and you’ll be ahead in the long run. |
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