Things I miss about Gambling in the past

The inability from making money by deliberately losing

i've quit but smoking must be up there with most in the bookies

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ei8XHoCXxI

prob get more on 1957

rapid late headway on the extel commentary.

Extel commentaries - The late Dougie Fraser - Rapid Late Headway - any other Scots on here will know what I mean - the rush when you heard those words was like nothing else!!!  Magic !!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sp_ndcKNZHM&index=15&list=PLvWoMVGdsAKbwGcgM...

All sitting there glued, to the usually old fellow, chalking up the prices and trying to nick a price change especially when he was a bit slow.

Telephonic interruption Alexandra Park.

The 10% betting tax. You didn't pay it on course, so was a good excuse to go racing.

thinking you'd just been touched off on the blower.
check the paper the next day, beat 3 lengths.

Tote Double and Tote Treble. Proper bookies tickets. Raleigh Gilbert commentaries. Going out on the course without being harassed by 'elf and safety' nutters. No bumpers on a six race card. Double figure fields in novice chases. The favourite winning the last race maiden at Windsor on a Monday evening.

'Rapid late headway' on Extel, then reading the Life close up the following day, ' always prominent led 2 f out , ran on strongly' '

No quarter odds a place with 8 or more runners. No one third odds a place on 5 to 7 runners.
No Wednesday Derby, Ebor or other big races.
The pocket size pull out results section from the Handicap Book.
Charlie Smirke and Lester Piggott.
Handicaps that went down to 7-7
Ally Pally on a Monday night and a mad rush to get there from SW18 after work.
Better prices and working for a few months with a Guy whose sister had a jockey boy friend.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mEGAETonEgY&index=17&list=PLvWoMVGdsAKbwGcgMBhr5Jz9_fjBiLFge

1976 bookies in above clip. The bloke settling is pretty nifty.

races going off at the same time as each other.

Betting on the French Trotting when the winter weather had wiped out U.K. racing . Having a punt on the Jolly , only for it to be disqualified after about 2 furlongs . It was covered on the " blower " , and you had to take it in good faith that your selection had broken into a canter/gallop !

the 'Easy Six' on the pools coupon

the boch /jinx (every shop had one )  if you backed the same as him you knew you were fooked !

One-man independents who did things like offering their own ante-post prices, and laying the fractions to boot.

Betting on-course against men who laid wagers of thousands of pounds on the basis of half an hour in the car park glancing through the Life. And with no Betfair or early prices to tell them what odds to offer either.

Concrete posts on the running rails, ensuring that the course and race distances were always the same.

Ken Hussey's standard times.

Drop fences at Haydock.

Unforgiving fences at Wetherby.

Unforgiving drop fences at Aintree.

The last day of the NH season at Stratford on the first Saturday in June.

Happy New Year in the bar of the Queen's Hotel at Newton Abbot on the first Saturday in August.

Fun, friends and fresh air.

Dick Whitfords ratings on the Sporting Lifes settlers page
Hunting around on the floor for that discarded"winning betting slip")after racing)
Getting a nosh off the cashier(female)(again after racing)

NOT NECESSARILY IN THAT ORDER

Queens Hotel in NA been closed for a year or two now.

The racing commentary L P's ( winter '63)...  5/1 the field... different groove ensured a different result !


Punters' asked for the L P when raving resumed !!!!              

^ Racing *

Mai ****

smoke filled bookies with coloured plastic strip drapes on the door and blokes marking up the boards and commentary from the radio.

nicking prices on horses and changing forecasts on the dogs after the off when some soppy **** who should never been employed in a bookies knew what had happened.

crying when the bookies went bust

the smell of pish in there toilets

Plus limited loo roll

Making Rapid Headway....Yeah right....We fell for that one for years ffs.....He must have been p1ssing himself laughing every time he used that line.

Studying hard to back winners.

Being able to discuss racing with other betting shop customers.

The old boys betting on the dogs in the morning.

Greyform dog summaries.  No need to read form, everything summed up in a half a sentence.

Miss the Sporting Life, and some of the names of racing but really it's so much easier now to make money than in the past.

I may have been an hopeless beginner in those days (85-92) but 10% and 9% tax regimes and higher overrounds made it much harder IMO.

On a side note is it just me but have the bookie overrounds gone way up since Chelt?

Going home reeking of smoke and my mum saying "you've been in that place again!".

Saturday, five to eleven (in old time)...   10.55 to you:

Dogs parading

Dogs going into the traps

They bet:

No offers Trap 1
6/4       Trap 2
3/1       Trap 6
10/1      Trap 5
10/1      Trap 4
16/1      Trap 3

Hackney, they bet:

8/11      Trap 1

Off Hackney 11.01

Off Hackney

After the off:

8/15      Trap 1

And at Hackney

Round the first bend

2 1 6 4 5 and 3

Down the back

Still 2

1 2 4 5 6 and 3

Round the last bend

2 4 1 5 3 and 6

2 and 4

4

Gone past together

Photo finish Hackney

Waiting

At Hackney, it's a photo between Trap 2, Bernie's Cakehole

and Trap 4 Laura's Patrick

PAUSE

Result coming from Hackney:

Sorry, at Hackney, add to the photo:

Trap 1 Illavarph and
Trap 6 Noway

LONGER PAUSE

Result coming from Hackney:

Winner Trap 6, Noway
Second Trap 1, Illavarph

Sps Hackney

6/4 and 8/15

STONY SILENCE

Hackney totes:

Win    Trap 6 13p
Places Trap 6 13p
and    Trap 1 97p

Forecast 6 and 1 £5.08

Eight times until the racing started - brilliant!

Having someone behind the counter who could accurately settle a bet in seconds without the aid of a machine.

the days when the bookies would take a decent sized bet without PTL

L. Piggott
P. Eddery
W. Carson
S. Cauthen
J. Mercer
E. Hide

Standing in the local independent with a pint from the boozer next door, recipe for disaster.

Sneaking in the Betting Office door at 15 and listening to the commentary.

When there was a photo, hoping they read your one out first, they rarely got it wrong

"The Echange Telegraph Company Testing  12345-54321  end of test"  Words still echo in the ears all these years later!!!

They days when you didn't have that irritating sound of a ball going round a roulette wheel on a screen...!!!

HUTTON tipster in Raceform handicap book every week
1/5th odds 16-21 runner h'cap...you only got a 1/4 if 22+
win only 2-5 runners...Lads were brave in the 80s stating they were 'prepared' to take ew bets on 5 runner races(!)
4% tax on-course
Victoria blower in attendance at main meetings only...it told you on Jackson & Lowe settler sheet
Scottish Extel!

.

They used to pull the top off the betting slip & give you the bottom part back... that paper had a certain aroma

Form figures that didn't go beyond 4th place.  Meaning some races at Brighton where every horse just had 0000000 next to it.  Murky, mysterious and strangely seductive.

jmdc 26 Mar 16 08:12
Going home reeking of smoke and my mum saying "you've been in that place again!".

I got caught out by that one a few times jmdc, always a give away for the old dear!

Fond memories...spending afternoons aged 15/16 stood in a virtually blackened room (no windows) with a load of stinking blokes, listening to invisible races, with (as above) the form figures of 0000-00 and somehow managing to back 4 winners....loving it.

Copper walking past an open door on a windy day and chucking out me and my 16 year old mate, bollacking the indi bookie who always took our bets - didn't need the smoke to let me mum know that day.

Listening to the race on the blower when the horses went out of sight...then reappearing in a different order.

Being asked if you wanted to pay tax on the stake.

People at the races with dozens of badges hanging from their binoculars

Reliable informatiuon.

Lots of happy memories on this thread sad gits ain't we

course enclosure
silver ring
tatts
members

travelling to the stow or wembley stadium on my suzukiRG125 - down the north circular with my brother on the back.

fish and chips, pint, then out to study for the first. rushing to back a dog as the hare came round, then waiting in anticipation for the traps to open.

Londons White City, dogs ran on grass. Irish dogs having trial runs round the course before the Derby started, they all had a mystic about them.

Crushing into a taxi at Wimbledon station where the driver charged two bob a head to go to the stadium.

boardmarkers
albert davison bringing keno hill up to carlisle for a touch in the seller
johnny seagrave
geoff lewis+phillip waldron + their raids up to ayr
jack berry on the flat,dickinson on the jumps
richard baerlien writing in the guardian
the grey monk
kildimo

Jesus Milo the old days sound depressing.

Was it White City where the outside traps had a huge advantage when there was heavy rain?