A Bridge Jumper In Iowa
Prairie Meadows Race Track is located near Des Moines, Iowa and at this time of year cowboys race their quarter horses. Friday and Saturday they run at night and on Sunday they run in the afternoon. I'm very glad I found this race track because the races are almost always done by 10:30pm. When I got into quarter horse racing after they came back to Hialeah Park I was sort of stuck on night races from Los Alamitos in Cypress, California and they did not start until about 10:00 pm. It made for a very long night.
The first race at PRM was an 870 yard race. A long race for the quarters. I had downloaded the form and was busily handicapping the races and listening to John Hernandez go over his picks for the evening. John works at Hialeah after his Iowa gig is over writing for the track.
He sort of "casually" mentions that $15,000 has been bet in the show pool on Gun Powder Kid. Immediately, I check the pools and there is less than $100 has been bet on the horse in the win pool and now there is over $15,000 in the show pool where you will collect if your horse finishes 1st, 2nd, or third. Gun Powder Kid looks like the very obvious favorite and in my mind will almost certainly finish third or better. In this race he only needs to beat two horses to turn $15,000 into $16,500. Not a bad return for a race that will last about 45 seconds.
Courtesy of a post from the Daily Racing Form and story about a mysterious "Lady In Red" that made big show bets:
The first race at PRM was an 870 yard race. A long race for the quarters. I had downloaded the form and was busily handicapping the races and listening to John Hernandez go over his picks for the evening. John works at Hialeah after his Iowa gig is over writing for the track.
He sort of "casually" mentions that $15,000 has been bet in the show pool on Gun Powder Kid. Immediately, I check the pools and there is less than $100 has been bet on the horse in the win pool and now there is over $15,000 in the show pool where you will collect if your horse finishes 1st, 2nd, or third. Gun Powder Kid looks like the very obvious favorite and in my mind will almost certainly finish third or better. In this race he only needs to beat two horses to turn $15,000 into $16,500. Not a bad return for a race that will last about 45 seconds.
Courtesy of a post from the Daily Racing Form and story about a mysterious "Lady In Red" that made big show bets:
The racing industry does not keep statistics on big show bets. But a glance at Internet message boards and Twitter feeds that attempt to keep tabs on bridge jumpers reveals no shortage of action: Five-figure plunges are an everyday occurrence. Ordinary midweek claiming races at Charles Town and Mountaineer attract show pools in the vicinity of six figures. And two of the largest bridge-jump bets of 2013 were losers: On July 27, Doinghardtimeagain ($440,895 bet to show) finished fourth in the Fleet Treat Stakes at Del Mar, and on Sept. 29, Departing ($273,377) ran fourth in the Oklahoma Derby at Remington Park.
Given such a perilous path to profits, why so many bridge jumpers?
“Ever heard the phrase ‘A fool and his money are soon parted?’ ” said Jeff Platt, president of the Horseplayers Association of North America.
Platt said he has calculated that bridge jumpers betting into nickel-minimum pools must hit at a 97 percent strike rate to make money. Estimating that even the best of handicappers can pick a “lead-pipe cinch” to run third only about 90 percent of the time, Platt doesn’t see how bridge jumpers stay solvent if all that’s involved are straight show bets.
There was only $178,364 bet on the entire program on Saturday Night from all sources, about 10% came from one bet and the track paid out. Other tracks probably would have cancelled show wagers for the race.
Last night, the the plunger got out alive. Sometimes there are train wrecks and you never know what hit you.
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