iirc In one of his first comeback strolls to victory the fights in the crowd were more violent than his efforts that day
2 Likes
Haha Tony, you’re right about Fury; but I find it amusing after your GMB presenter comments 
yeah, but I know I’m a Muppet
1 Like
Does any of the proposed change in gambling advertising/controls and limits etc. apply to the National Lottery or any of the other charity lotteries that seem to have an abundance of money to throw at expensive advertising slots? Never seen anyone buying a scratch-card in a shop who actually looks like they can afford it. Rarely seen one make it more than 2m from the till without scratching it, and never seen anyone collect winnings without ploughing a big chunk back into more tickets. Also I would include these heavily and expensively promoted £3M house draws in London, Cotswolds etc. which 'guarantee a charity donation to…[dead donkeys / anal warts relief / insert good cause here] and currently manage to fall just under the legal bar of being a scam but do not seriously stand up to much scrutiny and are a sucker-magnet for a certain section of the population.
So in Aus the Melbourne Cup is probably a bigger deal than the Grand National is here.
At the time of this story my wife was working in Sydney. So in the morning she and her friend popped down to the pub to make her bet (within the pub there is a tab (?) where you make your bets.) She had a couple of tips, so put a bet on them and then remembered that there was a third horse that someone had suggested. So as a last minute thought she had a one dollar bet which was in the form of a tri-factor . This basically paid out if your three horses came in, in the first three places (order irrelevant). She then goes back to work and watches the race in the afternoon.
So anyway the first two horses come in and then her friend reminds her about the third as is pretty convinced that Jan has won the tri-factor as well. She they drive down to the pub to pick up the winnings. Jan hands in the first two slips which net her a little money and then hands over the tri-factor slip.
‘So how much have I won?’ Says Jan. They are in a crowded pub of by now mostly drunk punters so the lady wont tell her. Rather she turns the screen around to show Jan at which point her friend, who is also drunk, lets out a loud scream. For her one dollar bet she has won just under 11,000 dollars!!
The cashier tells her to wait as someone will be out with her winnings. Ten minutes later a very large bloke walks out taps her on the shoulder and instructs her and her friend to walk very casually back to the car as he has got her winnings.
He tells her then to get in the car and chink the window so he can pass through the envelop. At this point Jan is expecting a cheque. Oh no, its all cash and not high denominations; so its a very thick envelope. She has to sign for the money and also give her address. She then drives home and says goodbye to her friend
At the time she was a single girl living by herself alone with all that money and she had just given her address to a large bloke who she didn’t know. So that night she didn’t get a wink of sleep and slept with a knife under her pillow. 
17 Likes
Now that’s a story!!!
Just woke up to that story.
Belter, thank you.
1 Like
Melb Cup day is a horrible day office wise. Everyone and their dog becomes a punting expert. It’s a holiday in Vic but not in the rest of Oz, it used to be earlier in the day but gradually got later because offices would have a MC lunch and then nothing would get done for the rest of the day.
TAB= the government run bookies, they have separate ‘shops’ in the high street and most pubs have a TAB section. Betting is heavily regulated in Oz.
Phar Lap is the most famous horse story in Oz.
It’s ‘trifecta’ btw 
1 Like
I have a few quid on the football, literally £2 here and there, maybe a fiver when feeling flush! Used to only do it when actually going West Ham, usually a scorecast but some of the bigger teams give good odds just for the win, last year put a fiver on West Ham to win when I went to the Bridge @ 9-1! £45 up, paid for my ticket and a couple pints (all away game tickets are capped at £30). Had some good ones with mates when we’d go as a group to football, we all chuck in a fiver and get beer money if we won something, 1-0 down to Blackburn in 2005, bet 3-0 second half result and won about £300 between us. Cheered Di Canio missing a penalty for us once as we had scorecast which came in with that miss. When I first starting working at the Bank there were a lot of horse racing fans, one guy would drop £100’s each day. Crazy stuff.
1 Like
Thanks, I should have mentioned that it was over 20 years ago so the win was all the more significant
1 Like
Thanks I knew I would get the spelling of that wrong! I even checked on Google!!!
I have another Melbourne cup story but must do some work first !
1 Like
Euromillions is £180M tonight.
Just sayin’
4 Likes
Looks like the house wins again!
9 Likes
That reminds me, I meant to drop this article in here…
3 Likes
Having spent some years now, following Vegas forums, and trying to ‘get my mind around’ gambling, I have to conclude that (and to be fair I have read books on how gambling addicts you by design, etc)…
-
I can see how table minimum betting with scantily clad dealers flirting with you (eg Stevens properties in Vegas) could be entertaining fun.
-
But, if you are prone to the subtleties of how games and casinos are designed to literally addict you, compounded if you have a friendly host, I have sympathy. Why? You are literally being led little step by little step into addictive behaviour. (As the above WSJ article also alludes to).
Apparently it takes 6 months of slot play or 3 years of table play to addict the average punter.
But it is a cracking way to help know yourself better! From the man who has only ever spent half an hour or so in one casino. But I think a lot.
Remember this there are estimated several hundred people globally who will happily blow $25million in a weekend (50 bankroll bets of half a million each). I struggle to get my mind around anything above 25 grand, which I equate to someone’s salary. Perhaps 160 times an hour (if solo playing).
Apparently some will take even higher bets.
Vegas is a very strange place. We flew into there when I did IM St George in 2011 and spent a few days there. I don’t think we’ll be rushing back.
We were probably the only people there who didn’t gamble a cent, not even on the slot machines.
The whole place is set up to actively encourage you to go to the casinos. The walkways that join the big hotels take you through the middle of the casino floors, so if you are just going to the shopping mall or a restaurant or a show, the shortest and coolest route is usually through a casino. There’s people at the tables and putting money in the slot machines any hour of the day.
I think most of the casinos have waitresses serving free drinks to anyone who is gambling, which can’t be good for people’s judgement.
3 Likes
TBF, that’s about the same as any App these days 
The morality of using that data to encourage addiction is questionable, the rest of it?
Meh.
2 Likes
The countryside North of Stoke is lovely though. Probably lives near footballers in Cheshire. Or she LOVEs oatcakes?
3 Likes
For those of you with a little time on your hands this is a great read
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-05-03/the-gambler-who-cracked-the-horse-racing-code
Won’t ruin the story but it’s a good un.
There is also Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich.
My understanding is that in certain ‘games’ the house can be beaten, consistently. But they kick you out if they find you are winning.
(strikes me as a little unreasonable, a bit like a kid smashing up a game that they are losing)
I trade futures markets. I suppose that is a form of gambling. One difference (and it is an important one) is that it doesn’t have a binary outcome. There is no ‘compulsion’ to get ‘this win’.