THE HKJC
PRESENTS
“HOW TO BE AN INSTANT BILLIONAIRE.”
STARRING A CAST OF THOUSANDS THIS SATURDAY AT SHATIN!
IT’S EXCITING!
IT’S FRUSTRATING!
IT’S EXHILARATING!
IT’S A TRIPLE TRIO WORTH HK$28 MILLION- AUD$3.5 MILLION!
FIGURE EXPECTED TO DOUBLE!!!
CO-STARRING A DOUBLE TRIO JACKPOT OF HK$330,000 AND EXPECTED TO REACH OVER HK$500,000!
“UNBEATABLE!” SAYS RACING PUNDIT M.Y, PAPADUM
“ICOMPAREABLE!” COOS RACING GROUPIE FUK ME
“YUMMY” SAYS FOOD CRITIC I.M. BLOATED
“MAKES FACEBOOK SHARES LOOK LIKE S***!” CLAIMS MARK SUCKERBERG
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LET’S CHANGE THE GOALPOSTS, SHALL WE?
Betting can be a funny business- and with the keyword here being business.
As long as you’re losing and paying up on time, everything is mighty fine: “Sure, we’ll credit you another $50k, sure, you have fixed odds, sure, you can have Best Tote on all bets, sure, we’ll kiss your ass for you..”
Punters forget this word: Business and that many times, one is swimming with sharks.
This only hits home when the unthinkable happens along with The Unsinkable Molly Brown: You actually start to win- and we don’t mean winning $5-10k.
We’re talking about winning over $50k and once this happens, the goalposts are moved and everything changes: Yes, We Can becomes, Go Somewhere Else or else Play By Our Rules.
The businessman surfaces and it’s a hard-nosed one who sees their earnings taking a dive: The mug has suddenly stopped being mugged and has become the mug-ger- and this is bad for business and something must be done.
We have received a spate of emails recently from disgruntled punters about these Changing Of The Guards- and not just for the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee: Swing When You’re Winning has been stopped and a few high-profile online betting shops are said to be “only good to you when you’re losing. Start winning and the sirens go off and the rules change.” “Best tote” comes, “You must pick the tote- and we all know what this means as many of us have been mugged before.
What do we think?
Well, betting online means taking your life- and your bets- into your own hands.
Often, betting is closed when horses are even still in the parade ring.
Sometimes, technology being technology, there are glitches and bets don’t go through.
Call to make a bet, and this could also go tits up as lines can get jammed or “the race is already on”.
We even know of hackers who have hacked into three websites- one in NZ and two in Oz- and stolen entire data bases.
More on this later as we have the names and understand one other online betting site in the UK is to soon be hacked and another Pandora’s Box will be opened.
Here’s the rub: These hackers are no even punters. They are, well, Anonymous and they simply wish to prove that they can.
It’s not unlike Wikileaks or Occupy Wall Street or the advent of Anonymous and V For Vendetta.
We are living in strange times and reminiscent of the French Revolution- but taking place the world over.
Previous “Untouchables” are being exposed and arrested or setup to be arrested.
The online world has become a perilous one and which has been well and truly exposed by the gawdawful failure of the Facebook IPO.
Facebook is suddenly Failbook and Mark “Zuck” Zuckerberg is now simply known as “Suck.”
Look at how Linkedin was hacked last night.
Hacking into online betting sites with its loosey goosey “security systems”? Easy.
Online betting sites, all of them, need to understand just how vulnerable they are, the need to respect the customers they have, how to look very closely at what their own staff is doing- and, perhaps, whom they might actually be working with- and for- and to play by the rules.
We predict a day very soon, when these sites would have out-stayed their welcome and will be forced to close up shop as the only people using them will be the Old School guard who will wager a massive $50 win bet on the trots or bet $10 on Myatta or Black Caviar.
This is when it will make NO sense to keep these businesses going and time to bail.
Technology has overtaken many and the one-time faithful old clients are now older and there are no younger clients willing to play by the old rules.
In simple English, You’re fucked, mate.
Frankly, the online customer base- especially in Oz- has reached saturation point and “profit earnings” are barely enough to pay staff.
Beware The Ides Of March- and also April, May, June, July etc- and reaching the point when one has a knife in their back and moans, Es tu, Brute?
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VISIT www.fasttrack.hk
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THE VENGEANCE OF DARTH
It’s been his annus horribilus of a season aka a right fucking pain in the arse year, but David “Darth Vader” Ferraris aka “The Hoarse Whisperer” is smiling again. Well, smirking might be more accurate. From having had a measly eleven winners at the end of April, “Darth” has struck back with a vengeance and has seen his stable bang in seven winners in less than two months. What’s happened? Has he shaved his head for good luck? Have the fung shui god smiled on him for moving the furniture in his apartment? When asked, “Darth” aka “The Hoarse Whisper” whispered to us in a voice totally unsuitable to karaoke, “Fucked if I know.”
Besieged, bewitched, bothered and bewildered by rumours of him leaving Hong Kong, he saw many of his best horses leave for other stables. There were then all that construction work next to his and the stables of Sean Woods and which stirred up Darth’s horses and Darth himself and which put him in an even more Darth and Dark Mood than usual.
We are told that for months, Darth was holed up in his bedroom “doing” a Howard Hughes, allowing his nails to grow, refusing to see anyone and screaming to himself whenever there was a full moon out. When there was no full moon, he would spend hours constantly banging his head against a padded cell which long-suffering wife Pam had mad part of the new refurbishing.
And then, everything clicked and clacked into place and with Darth’s greatest moment this season being the win of Liberator in the Champions and Chaters Cup and given a masterful ride by sometime-“Wayward” Weichong Marwing.
While, the sun is smiling on “Darth”, a few other stables are struggling. Andy Leung, the eternally young local trainer finds it as tough to get a winner as when he was a jockey- a totally crap one. The ever-popular Tony “Millie The Juju” Millard is going through a bit of a slow patch and with Jolly Victor being a certainty beaten on the weekend. After a brief winning spurt, Sean Woods is back in the, well, woods and with the flop of Saddler’s Lodge on Wednesday forcing us to say, “We told you so” to a certain leading jockey. The horse is feeble and a non-winner.
Caspar Fownes is having an Okay season, but wait for him next season to come with all guns blazing. Francis Lui has winners which no one notices as does David Hall. As for “Jungle John” Moore the smoke signals and jungle drums are saying that he will continue without a stable jockey and, instead, will rely on Brett Prebble, Dougie Whyte and Tim Clark. But how long before his owners with some hugely expensive horses will want a full-time jockey? And even with their insistence, who can “Jungle John” tempt to take over the job? Chad Lever? We know that our old mate Neil Paine might consider it- as long as he can ride all horses one way: Chaaaaaaaarge to the front and hope for the best.
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VISIT www.fasttrack.hk
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