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A typical day during Cheltenham week for Neil means getting up at 3am. (5am the rest of the year, same as me as it happens).
He studies the Racing Post first (he gets a copy delivered early as he's classed as a bookmaker), then peruses all the betting feeds on Twitter, followed by studying the form, runners & riders in every single race.
His system is to work through every horse in the race, &, one by one, eliminate those he has no plans to back or recommend. That will leave him with between 2 & 5 selections for each race.
Then he has to write the articles - 1 per race, & his schedule is to publish the first at 9am, then every 30 minutes, so the 7th & last piece each day goes up at Noon. By then, remember, he's been working for 9 hours. And whilst writing & studying, he has to field texts, phone calls, e-Mails & the like, often from friends & acquaintances wanting him to tip them a winner.
2 to 5 horses in some races? Yup.
Some free tips for you here, as to pro sports betting on horse racing.
Rule # 1 - it is NOT about selecting winners, it is about selecting VALUE.
He will often dismiss a long odds on shot as it is not value, a horse priced at 2/5 & almost certain to win won't be recommended at 1/3. It's not value. At 1/2 yes, at 1/3, no. That is the very basis of successful sports betting.
His favourite races are where there is a good "shape" to the betting market, with a short priced favourite, and plenty of others priced at 6/1 & above. If the bookies offer extra places as a concession, he'll often recommend up to 5 or 6 - yes - horses in a single race. He believes it is almost impossible to have a bad bet in some races with the right betting shape.
2 or 3 years ago, in the opening Supreme Novices Hurdle (now sponsored by Sky Bet), he recommended that I back SIX horses each way. I did, & we made a tidy profit. Who'd have thought? The bookies rarely make those offers, but when they do, he's all over it. His favourite line is punish those bookies.
2 years ago, he recommended Lord Windemere as the Gold Cup winner at 40/1. We all got on, & it was oioi all afternoon as the horse duly trotted up.
He does have lengthy losing spells, but its like variance in poker, or playing MTT's, you just have to look at the long term, & he shows a profit every year.
I can barely recall him backing a favourite, as the jollies are almost always over bet (too short) so don't represent value. Value is the key, not finding winners at any price. A bookie builds a profit margin into his book, so to beat the bookies, you have to find a way to overcome that profit margin. It's rarely by backing favourites.
For that alone, I admire him greatly. In fact I admire anyone who works that hard.
I'm lucky to still have hair at my age.
I hadn't forgotten to reply Mrs Duck, Tikay pretty much described my mental week. Just woke up after 10 hours sleep, I didn't leave the phone by the bed so I had that thing of having no idea what time it was and I could easily get another 10 hours, just felt like I should try and get back to normal.
The prison was great, pretty pricey though if you were planning to put up a lot of people. The place is very much a boutique hotel, very fancy stuff in the room and nothing forgotten. I think the whole theme is cute and fun and of course the whole thing is close to the town centre.
My whole love of Oxford comes down to Inspector Morse. I've seen every episode at least a dozen times and when walking around I was thinking "He got murdered there". It is gorgeous.
I went to the Oxford Cup once, a fun poker event that attracts local enthusiasts, a lot of whom are students, as well as post-grads from London and other places to play a small buy-in tournament. I think it was happening a few days after we left actually but if anyone is from around there you should try it next year as it's good fun.
I managed a really terrible day 1 at Cheltenham followed by three small winning days. Tikay is right, I rarely suggest backing favourites at these big meetings as I have a long-term view that the value lies elsewhere. This year the people who did no study at all who just bet the favourite in every race had their best ever year.
Sometimes the lettuce eats the rabbit.