Competing with the Lotto

You need to go and stand at a lotto machine on a Sat am and pm to understand what I am saying. The guys taking the sporstake bet at the lotto machines study the soccer form of the teams before they take their bet.

They make an informed choice.

The sportstake on soccer takes in more money midweek and weekend than do the tote played soccer machines.

The guys then send one of their mates to go put the racing bets on at the closest tote.

The day has to come when they eventually realise that in addition to the soccer sportstake they might as well take some of the horserace betting money.

Dont say I didnt tell you.

Oscar
You are quite right.

Betting on sports is second only to poker in international growth.

But I'm afraid that they grow at the expense of horse racing, rather than the other way around. The investment of time that the fans of soccer, cricket etc already have, is now being captured by the gambling industry. Bookmakers are already starting to hold more money on (tax free!) sport, than some race meetings.

It's common place for people to sign up on sites and deposit R10,000 from their credit card and go all on a match they will watch.

My local bookmaker has gone from 6 terminals orginaly dedicated to horse racing, to 2 dedicated to racing and 4 to soccer and sell to queues of French speaking North African ummm..immigrants.

Sports betting is like watching China wake up, you wonder how much room will be left once they get going.

100s Jack..Im personally going to suggest it to the lotto guys.

Why don't the P ask for help, because it is clear that they need it!!!! I'm still waiting for a reply from 2 emails (1 was sent 3 weeks ago and the other last thursday) from 2 prominent so called friends of racing, but obviously my emails are not welcome- but hey the wheel turns and the people that count are the people that will make the difference in the long run.

Oscar- love the lotto idea- brilliant!!! to help the punter!!!!
We need to attract new blood to this game and from what I can see, we have the talent, but we need the right leadership.

Jason the unanswered email problem is not uncommon..

Ja I know, Hibernia, maybe I was a bit naive when I thought things could change.

On the other hand- maybe they did not receive it- lol, normal story.

Cousin Flloyd has not heard of email they cany understand all the envelopes opening over their solitaire very annoying.

Asked if you could stop with the emails.

Rather send a telegram they can read those. To many words make their heads hurt.

Jack Dash Wrote:

---

> Alcaponee
>
> I think you are missing my point.
>
> The life blood of horse racing is the gambling
> Rand.
>
> The gambling Rand had two possible routes:
> -Random (easy and mindless)
> -Skill (difficult)
>
> You have to say that racing is funded by repeat
> offenders, not like casual visitors to Sun City.
> And a long term bond is not formed by
> mindlessness, neither will you make much from
> passing trade.
>
> When I go to the races, I see many people I have
> known for 20 years. They still play the P6 and
> they still buy horses. My sister will
> occationally visit a casino, but will not put 1c
> on a horse because she knows at the casino she has
> the same chance as anyone, at a racecourse she has
> no chance against the learned.
>
> So the casual gambler is of no use to horse
> racing, which is a pursuit of enthusiasts, and are
> normally introduced by people already involved.
> The industry pisses on the enthusiasts, so now
> they are diminishing and therefore introducing
> less new blood.
>
> For 20 years racing has tried to grow the way you
> suggest, I wonder when they will notice it does
> not work.


Jack not sure that you got my point either. I was suggesting that there is a dedicated thread for this type of contribution.


I'm not sure that I agree entirely with your comments. No one enters racing a skilled horse racing gambler. I used to walk into the tote and drop ten bucks on a horse every now and then without knowing a thing. I never understood the significance of the red, green and black odds displayed on tellytrack but would look for green odds at around 14/1 and won money quite a bit this way at first. I knew of Pierre Strydom, Mark Khan and Marcus. In fact I did not realise that there were two Marcuses. I was relying on memory of my old mans playing days and actually thought that Anton and Basil were the same Marcus. I backed Dunford on this presumption.

Ive been plugging away at this for almost 5 years now and would say that I've done better in the earlier years not knowing anything. I have applied the same reasoning to the UK and have found myself doing better in the UK than SA.

What Oscar is suggesting is pull the non players in on the same basis as Sports Stake. What I am suggesting is pull the blind luck players in by offering a random number scenario. The best of both worlds skill and random with racing the chief benefactor.

jack dash, the pick 6 can be used as a 'gateway' drug to get the ball rolling.. life itself started as mindless. Promote the pick 6 as the saviour of racing? Hell yes!