Steve Muses On Various Matters
I’m sure you’re all familiar with the various intelligence tests. Best known would be that associated with Mensa. Following is the link to its test. I’m going to try it tonight over a glass of wine. You? https://www.mensaiqtest.net
Of course, I’m going to risk being monumentally embarrassed. That’s about 2-1 on.
But that’s OK because I’ve just done the test which measures your stupidity. Didn’t know about that one, did you?
It’s the function on the tab.com.au website which allows you to examine your betting spend versus dividends for up to 90 days. Think they’ve wisely decided it would be too scary for anyone to look beyond that term.
Imagine if there was a similar function on the stud book website! Now that would be frightening.
Anyway I bravely clicked the spend/dividends icon on the TAB site. It revealed that I’d bet approximately $11,000 in the 90 days to Monday this week. Seems a lot but it’s probably not… just the turnover factor. I’m not a big punter, not even a gambler really as I have consistently but unsuccessfully endeavoured to explain to many an uninitiated dinner guest over the years.
Never borrowed $500,000 to invest in a stallion, a Ponzi scheme or a restaurant. Perhaps not that silly after all. Never bet beyond my means, save for the occasional folly of youth.
What’s gambling anyway? I have always delighted in the story about a part-owner, of the very good 1980’s stayer Allez Bijou (Noble Bijou), who had a news agency. He apparently had an elderly female customer who would regularly spend a good deal of money on tatts tickets and the like.
“You might like to have a couple of dollars on my horse in the Sydney Cup. He’ll be hard to beat,” he said one morning. “How dare you suggest I would gamble,” she replied with great indignation. Or perhaps she just knew the horse was destined to run second.
But, guess what, when it comes to the punt I am a winner. I collected precisely $70.25 more than I out-layed.
Therein lies the stupidity. Let’s say I spent ten hours a week (which would be extremely conservative) doing the form, that would be 130 hours work for wages of $70.25. On the current Fair Work award rates, I’d have picked up almost $2400 for washing dishes at any restaurant for the same amount of time.
And my positive return on investment included a princely $10 each way on 100/1 winner Northern Journey (Good Journey) at Flemington last Saturday.
My delight at that perspicacious prognostication was somewhat evaporated when Nick Heathcote, from Betfair, pointed out that Northern Journey returned $219.86 on the Betfair BSP – whatever that is? Apparently it’s the Betfair Starting Price which I’m going to check out as I’d clearly, otherwise, be a fool to myself and a burden to others.
Of course, these numbers cannot measure the immeasurable entertainment I enjoyed while failing to ensure my financial security by means of the punt. Nor do they acknowledge my financial contribution to the industry via the TAB pool deductions.
So, we’ve established I’m stupid. No Einstein. Although I prefer to see it as insanity. There would, of course, be no horse racing if we were all sane.
It was, allegedly, Einstein who said the definition of insanity is doing something over and over again and expecting the same result. And, naturally, I will keep betting over and over again despite having another of Einstein’s quotes ringing in my ears: “Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former.”
Interestingly if you google Albert Einstein horse-racing, the following question bobs up on the ABC’s Einstein Factor website.
- The name of which Melbourne Cup winning horse of the 1960s consisted of the same word repeated? A. Gatum Gatum (by Star Of Baroda).
Bet, here I go again, that’s not on the Mensa test. But it made me chuckle because Gatum Gatum was trained by Graeme Heagney and the 1963 Melbourne Cup winner’s name, unsurprisingly, came up when Heagney’s son Peter – the golden voiced Inglis auctioneer – was interviewed at length yesterday morning on Melbourne’s RSN radio.
You can hear the interview at rsn.com.au (in case you missed it north of the Murray). An interview which reminded me why I am condemned to the stupidity outlined above.
One, because I fell in love with horses like the Heagney senior trained Tobin Bronze (Arctic Explorer) as a child. And, two, because betting was never really about the money. It was about validating an opinion and the sheer delight in solving any form puzzle. I concede my time could have more gainfully spent from an early age.
South Australian-trained horses fascinated me as a youngster. Not only the stars which emerged from the Cummings, Hayes or Hawkes teams but more the lesser knowns like Bonfield, Lipman, Miss Lockleys, Lockley’s Tradition, Romantic Son, Hartbalm, Idolou, Manihi, Redelva and New Atlantis.
A little later, in the mid 80’s and my mid 20’s, there was the extraordinary run of West Australian sprinters including Placid Ark, Coal Pak and Heron Bridge who were to be followed by Paklani, Singing The Blues, Dark Beau and and later again – of course – by Miss Andretti, Scenic Blast, Ellicorsam and Hay List, not to mention last Saturday’s Goodwood winner Vega Magic (Lope De Vega) maintaining the tradition. And I’m sure I’ve missed a few.
There always seemed to be something romantic, to me, about the horses from the so called ‘lesser’ racing states west of Victoria venturing to Melbourne. Moreso than, say, Tommy Smith sending an armada from Sydney.
Before my 21st birthday, I’d fallen in love with Light Fingers, Galilee, Tobin Bronze, Taj Rossi, Dulcify, Vain, Tauto and Gunsynd plus many of the aforementioned gallopers which I’ll concede has a south-east Australian bias.
To balance that, I asked Sydney reared journalist Stephen Brassell to name his favourites from his youth. His list – Kingston Town, Shaftesbury Avenue, Triton, Manikato, Baguette, Dulcify, Grand Cidium, Red Anchor, Gunsynd and Emancipation. A slightly more northern bias.
I also polled Russell Smith, the one time travelling foreman for Tommy Smith and pool manager at Randwick, who was right in the middle in a sense. Born just north of the Murray, raised just south of it and his list reflects that. Gunsynd, Kingston Town and Luskin Star from the north and Manikato and Vain from the south along with Tontonan whose racing and training was split between Victoria and New South Wales.
Such were the names which sealed our fate and condemned us to our stupidity.