Racing: Miracle punt comes up just short

Troy Harris made a winning return at Cambridge when guiding Is That So to victory at Cambridge yesterday.

A mystery punter nearly pulled off a miracle $331,808 collect at Cambridge yesterday with a bet that had TAB bookmakers reeling.

But the punter was let down by third favourite Astradeel fading away in the closing stages of the last race, which was the last leg on an inspired five-leg multi.

The punter, who is unknown to the bookmakers because the bet was placed across a retail counter using cash, placed a $200 win multi bet on five races.

When Samina Bibi ($5.50), Calvaria ($4.20), Papenhuyzen ($4.50) and Magic Touch ($4.20) all won at fixed odds the punter went into the last race set to make a $331,608 profit if Astradeel won.

The eight-start maiden was given plenty of time to settle early by rider Jonathan Riddell but loomed up behind the leading pack at the 500m mark to look a winning chance.
But he never really threatened to run past the leaders in the 2000m race won by outsider Viper.

He faded to fifth and left the punter with a what-might-have-been story and a $200 souvenir.

Had the bet been placed on a TAB account the bookmakers would have given punter the option to "cash out" before the last leg was run, taking a hugely-discounted dividend but still massive profit.

But that option isn't available for over the counter cash bets so the punter had no option but to watch their bet of a lifetime run, their nerves not helped by a late drift in the market support before the jump.

"It certainly created some excitement for a Wednesday afternoon at Cambridge," said TAB bookmaker Thad Taylor.

"Being a retail bet we have no idea who it was and had it been via an account we would have given the punter the cash out option and that would have been interesting. It is a rare bet. You don't often see a $200 multi with five straight horses like that and whoever it was did a good job to get that far.

"Fair to say, he or she had our attention."

Taylor says the Cambridge synthetic meetings tend to attract solid interest in their regular Wednesday afternoon slots, moreso than Riccarton when racing on the plastic track.

That is hardly surprising as Riccarton has only held a handful of synthetic meetings so punters are still working the track and the southern synthetic form out whereas Cambridge has been holding meetings on the synthetic for over a year and also hold a lot of trials on it too so punters have far more relevant data at their disposal.

"Also punters love backing the big name stables so when you get Stephen Marsh, Andrew Forsman, Tony Pike and even the occasional Te Akau horse lining up on a Wednesday that drives a lot of punter interest," says Taylor.

Harris makes winning return

Troy Harris made a winning return at Cambridge when guiding Is That So to victory in the Stables 970.

The 34-year-old jockey took a break from riding on raceday late last spring to give his body a break.

Harris said he has got back on top of his weight and is enjoying being back out on the track.

"The body just needed a bit of a break from wasting, so I had a few months off and got the weight down," Harris said.

"When the body says I need a break, I just have a break.

"I rode 57.5kg today so that is good at this time of year for me.

"I will just keep ticking along at that weight until spring time and then start going a bit lower."

- with NZ Racing Desk