First of all I will get the boring money bit out of the way, January was a good month for the horses recording a profit of £1250, sadly the same cannot be said for the golf with a loss of £700. This is not the reason for the post below, one month makes no difference in the grand scale of things, I wrote this last night, slept on it, but it’s how I feel.
I think the past 12 months has taught us all a lot about ourselves, if it hasn’t well you need a damn good talking to. For me personally it has meant a lot of chopping and changing what I do and ultimately what I enjoy doing and what I waste time doing, it really isn’t always about the money – though obviously that helps. I have bet on golf for the best part of 30 years and for a “living” the past 20 though the income has dwindled over the years. I will admit I have got bored and tired of it and the last 12 months has brought it home to me why. I am not a big sports fan (will come to that in a bit) but it has provided a means to an end for me, but I will be honest watching golf largely bores me. When lockdown happened and we all started looking around I found a lot of joy in following and betting on Minor Tour golf, everyone was talking about it and it was great finding new life stories yet within a matter of months it’s all been forgotten, which I find sad. I think I would rather watch some player fighting to pay his bills on something called Periscope than watching some multi millionaire playing for millions on Sky. Then this week the “European” tour and many of the top echelons of golf will fly to Saudi to play for the “Saudi Dollar” whilst saying we are growing the game – sorry that’s just bollocks – the big names are just growing their bank balances. This is where I bring my attitude to sport in to play, believe it or not I was a huge football fan until one day – 27th January 2002 (yeah I had to look it up, my memory is not that great) when Jamie Carragher threw a coin back into the crowd, I stopped watching football that day. Money was beginning to get obscene in those days and it has spiralled out of control and I actually find sport difficult to watch with all that money involved, it’s just my opinion, but golf is going the same way. Don’t get me wrong it has nothing to do with me making money betting on golf, I still do, but when I am struggling to watch it, it becomes harder to bet on and therefore make money. This past month my favourite bet was on Chris Kirk because of his back story – fighting the demons which I can associate with – it was great to watch him regain his livelihood. I think talking to Ryan from Monday Q golf over the past 12 months has opened my eyes to players struggling to make their dreams come true, it has been great, and I really don’t begrudge players taking their seat at the table enjoying what their hard work deserves. So – I spend 50+ hours a week on golf betting, it isn’t losing money long term but I am sure I could spend those hours to better use and not get annoyed and frustrated to boot. I got into “betting” aged 8 betting on cards and horse racing 45 years ago and that passion for horse racing has been reignited over the past 10 months. I used to fool myself that betting on golf gave me more “value for money” as you got four days worth, to be frank what a load of crap it just gives me four days worth of anxiety and stress. I have only ever bet on National Hunt racing, the flat always brings in that money issue and “sand donkeys” are just bookie fodder. Don’t get me wrong money comes into play on NH racing – I simply don’t get those people who pay £500k on a P2P winner. A few years back I sponsored a whole meeting at my local track Newton Abbot, it was a fabulous day but the best bit was drinking champagne with the local farmer owner/trainer of a horse which turned over a Martin Pipe hotpot at 50/1, their passion was one of the best moments of my betting life, they raised the horse on the farm and it ran only a few times due to injury. Where does that leave me, and you dear reader, if you have managed to get this far! Well I will still be betting on golf but not to the extent it has taken over my life and I have to really cut back, maybe just the Betfair bets (I can’t get much on elsewhere anyway). The enjoyment and thrill has gone, everyone is bogged down in statistics which mean sweet FA really – look for players who can close the deal. Horse Racing – yeah I will carry on - I love it and have missed it from my life but will only bet in races I have identified I do well in – and there’s the crux, betting should be fun but it’s only really fun when you’re winning and not wasting countless hours of your life for very limited return.