I had been trying to find the time to commit this little article to paper - well electronic paper anyway, and in my attempt to entertain you here it is In the early sixties, the now defunct Daily Herald had a tipster named Supernap â Iâm not sure if his real name was ever revealed â who became the scourge of the bookies. Such was his success, that he went on to publish a book revealing his methods and â which was fairly revolutionary in this pre-computer era â his observations on trends based on historic data. His book was called Betting To Win, and I used to own a copy. I read it cover to cover several times, some of what he championed, I still retain to this day. Although, it has to be said that a lot of the things he based his own selections on have changed over the years with the re-aligning of minimum and maximum weights, course watering, starting stalls, etc. I have not owned this book for many a year now and am writing this from memory (not the best!) but I thought it may entertain some of you for a few minutes He offered various ideas on where and how to bet but think the singular most astonishing betting advice he recommended, was in ONLY betting on 2 year olds, and never on their first run. But, a previous runner, regardless of HOW it ran, if up against other track newcomers should be seriously considered on the premise that itâs first run would have given the horse a big experience advantage over newcomers. Superrnap was a big advocate of betting in 2yo races and considered that 2 year old form was far and away, more reliable than that of older horses, coupled with the fact of course that at an early age, even the trainers donât know enough about the horse to start âtinkeringâ with itâs abilities. He advised never to back in handicaps, selling races and amateur races. He did however go on to offer his thoughts on handicap betting for those who must, later in the book. He was also fairly scathing about each way betting in big handicaps, and puzzlingly, advised betting win only on any large priced horses. I have to say, I never did understand the reasoning here. Where he DID advocate each way betting (and one of the reasons that the bookies disliked him) was that he recommended each way betting in 8 runner races â even when your choice is the favourite. His reasoning was, that provided you are reasonably competent with your form reading, over a given period you will be ahead of the book. Indeed Supernap recommended betting place only, and regarded this as buying money, but his theory on this was largely instrumental in the bookies stopping taking place only, although interestingly in the current era, you can now do this again. This 8 runner, each way betting was a method that I pursued eagerly as a teenager, anxious to âgrowâ my pocket money! It does however, have a downside â it removes all the fun from tilting against the bookies in handicaps, trying to find the âblotâ! And the paltry sums I had available as a youth were never enough to get me banned from a bookmakers premises. His thoughts on the Classics were also interesting. In the Derby, for instance, he would only consider a horse if it had been either bred by a Derby winner, or was closely related to a Derby winner. He wasnât too keen on the St Leger, as he felt that late developers, and over-raced horses gave results too much unpredictability for his tastes, but saw both the Great Voltiguer at York, and the West of Scotland race at Ayr as being races offering the best pointers to the Leger winner. He also wasnât keen on the 1000 Guineas, his reasoning being that fillies donât start to find their true form until the summer â in fact one of his âdonâtsâ was not to back fillies against colts until July at the soonest. There were quite a few âdonâtsâ I seem to remember â as well as donât back fillies against colts before the end of July, there was donât place too much emphasis on apprentice weight allowances, donât bet at odds on and donât bet on the nanny were other snippets. I saw a copy on Ebay recently and bid for it, but lost â it only went for £11-50, I should have bid more â for nostalgia value if nothing else. As I said earlier, time has rendered many of Supernapâs theories irrelevant now, but some things may still be valid. If you are disciplined and follow one or two of his recommendations rigidly you WILL make a profit. Whether you enjoy the experience is another matter altogether!
I had that book also. When I get time I must try to find it but I've no idea if I still have it after 4 house moves. It would have got chucked out if a cat peed on it.
Good ideas are universal. Even in a far flung part of the planet, we hold some of those theories as a given. Never bet odds on. Colts usually beat fillies. Two year old form is usually more reliable. Better to back exposed two year old form against a first starter. Course and distance form is a major advantage. PS, nice article Reebs.
Good read Reebok... Seems like a interesting book, and a must read... May look it up myself... Cheers...
I also recall supernap from the early sixties ,was an avid follower and read his book i still remember polyphoto at 20/1 at lingfield ,but most of his naps were short priced as i remember his 2 year old selections ,were based on time and weight for instance if a horse won carrying 9 stone at par time it would get a rating of 100 the second /third horse would lose 2 points for every length beaten , they would also lose 2 pts for every 3 lbs under 9 stone or gain 2 points for every 3 lbs over 9 stone is the winner beat the par time it would get2 points for every one 5th of a second it beat it by , so if it beat par by one second carrying 9 stone it would get 110 points and the placegetters would be rated off 110 if it carried 9.stone 6lbs it would get 114 he would also take class into consideration ,by rating the racecourses , class 1 being newmarket ,sandown ,york etc and lingfield ,brighton etc being class 2 and wouldnt take a class 2 into a class 1 cheers mick
Oooh - old post resurrection! I'd forgotten about his ratings system Mick, I don't know if it would still be applicable in this day and age, and as every newspaper and media outlet have their own experts already doing something similar there may be no point! I'm pleased that ther eare still people around who remember this guy though - he was largely influentially in my initial interest in horse racing
