Guinness @ Cheltenham Festival 2014.
The first big horse racing festival of 2014 starts tomorrow and the bookies are after your money with gusto! You can tell when a sporting festival is going to be a bonanza for the bookies by the amount of giveaway bets they advertise. Giveaway bets are those enticing bets where the bookies either give you your money back or give you some other financial bonus for not backing the winner.
Just like when their betting shops offered £50 prize money to those who played the fixed odds betting terminals in their shop ‘tournaments’ which were free, they knew they would be getting that money back plus a lot more for their efforts. Bookies are not called turf accountants for nothing!
So every year I wait and see the advertisement for an event. If all the bookies, large and small, are going for it you know they say a bigger return in the future. The large firms are looking for brand new clients, probably teenagers and women. The smaller firms are looking for established bettors who need a new firm to change their luck.
The surprising thing that I have noticed is the lack of drink promotion that is usually part and parcel of Cheltenham Festival it seems that the betting firms have totally brought up all the advertising space for the festival, which really instil in me a fear of the days ahead. So good luck to all those who are playing tomorrow and don’t be worried if you fancy a big price runner it may have more chances than you think.