Blowing Chunks

I was again going out for the day, so I was up at six to work out my bets for the day. That meant that the last thing I did before going to bed on Friday night was gambling related, as was the first thing I did on Saturday morning. Hmmm...

I could find very little I fancied on the football coupon, so plumped for a £17 sixfold on Manchester United, Chelsea, Inter Milan and Udinese to win, with 'more than two goals' in the Hartlepool v Milton Keynes and Swindon v Leicester league games.

After a trip to Tesco and a quick workout in the gym, I had 45 minutes to spare. No prizes for guessing what I did. And I was on top form. Using various strategies, I made money on the first five races. And it was reasonable money – between £5 and £12 a race – meaning that I was £35 up for 40 minutes' work.

And then it happened. It was the final race before I had to leave the flat and a horse that I had laid successfully last week was running. I had noticed that it never ran well on soft ground, and although the going was good to soft (compared with heavy the last time I had laid it), I decided to lay it for £3 at 20, for an easy profit.

The race started and Chunky Lad settled in third place. It didn't look as if it was struggling with the ground, but it wasn't jumping as well as some of its rivals. The horse remained in third place, but confident in my theory about the going, I laid it for another £5 at 12.

Approaching the second-last fence, the favourite was going very easily, so I had £10 on it, just to increase my profits on the race. And then disaster struck. The favourite fell and Chunky Lad's other rival made a mistake. I tried to get a bet on Chunky Lad, but the price had plummeted to such an extent that I would have had to have £100 on just to recoup £20 if the horse had won. But if it had lost, I would have wasted £100.

It was such a hard choice – and I had a split second to make it – but I decided to let the bet run. Going over the last fence, Chunky Lad's rival took the lead – and it looked as if I had made the right decision. But Chunky Lad fought back and they passed the line together. It went to a photo (every big loss I suffer goes to a photo) and the price on Chunky Lad to get the verdict flashed up on Betfair at 1.08. I didn't need to wait around for the official result. I knew that I had lost £122 on the race.

Running total: I've thrown my calculator away