Hope springs eternal (again)

Our trip to Yarmouth on Monday seems a lifetime ago, but it's only been four days.  It was satisfactory and pleasing.  Das Kapital didn't win but he ran well to finish third of 13, beaten 1.25 lengths and a short head.  He looked a very possible winner for much of the race as he was perfectly positioned and travelling very kindly for Franny Norton, but at the same time the winner was going nicely all the way too.  It would have been nice if he could have won as that is likely to have been his last race before going to the Horses in Training Sale at the end of the month, but it was not to be.  He ran well, though, confirming that there are definitely races in him.

Monday was a fairly grim day but we managed not to be rained on during the trip.  We'd been rained on during the morning and have had plenty of rain fall on us since then; and miserable weather is always one thing which makes the days an effort, and makes four days seem a long time.  But, in fairness, I have had a break to my routine in the interim, and that always disrupts one's feel of the flow of time.  It was a good break, a good break in pretty much every respect - and one of its good points was well timed bearing in mind my reflections in the previous chapter about the future tightening of racing's belts (which were then reinforced at the start of this week by York, a course which would never plead poverty just for the sake of doing so, too issuing a warning about the impending diminution of its picture-rights income).

I was fortunate enough to be invited to a gathering in the Houses of Parliament on Wednesday.  I could and probably should have referred to it as an 'event' but I don't like using that word because everything is sillily described as an event nowadays.  People don't go to see a good play any more; they go to 'the theatrical event of the year'.  So I'll call it a soiree.  Why not?  It took place in the afternoon/early evening.  Anyway, this was hosted by Cheltenham's MP Laurence Robertson on behalf of 'Together for the Tote'.  (I've just looked at the invitation to check those details, and I see that it was a reception).

This was put on to celebrate/mark/publicise Alizeti's completion of its purchase of the Tote from Fred Done.  And that is certainly something worth celebrating.  The Tote has always had the potential to be a major source of funds for 'racing' but, in this country anyway, has never quite fulfilled its potential in the way that it has done elsewhere.  (The crucial difference, of course, is that it has never had a monopoly here, which has meant that it has always been fighting with one hand tied behind its back).  Since its purchase by Fred Done in 2011, it has been fighting with both hands tied behind its back.

When I first heard about the Alizeti project, I was somewhat dubious as to how much potential it might have.  The British betting marketplace is so competitive that it was (and still is) hard to see how any Tote could increase its share sufficiently to become a golden goose.  However, there had to be more than that because Alizeti's founder Alex Frost is a very brainy man who knows much more about any aspect of finance than I do - and he's a realist too - so if he thought that the project had potential, then it had to have potential, even if I was too dumb to see it.

Anyway, having learned more about the project at this reception, I'm full of enthusiasm.  The significant areas for possible expansion are overseas, and there are clearly plenty of them.  We know that British racing has its problems, but one good thing which it does have is a very good reputation.  And you could say exactly the same about the British Tote.  So far it has been hugely underselling itself as regards an international punting proposition.  Alizeti looks well placed to rectify that.  And if it can do so, then that's great news for all of us.

We've had the very unsatisfactory situation of so much of racing's schedule here being arranged around the supposed golden goose of the Racecourse Association selling the pictures to overseas markets, and nobody bar the RCA having any idea of how much money is generated, or of what happens to it.  Alizeti's trade will be far less opaque and nebulous, and I learned much more about the potential or otherwise for selling 'British racing' to overseas betting jurisdictions in two hours on Wednesday than I have done in a decade of being told that the July Cup has to be run on a Saturday because of a for-all-I-know-mythical pot of gold which supposedly lies at the end of the rainbow.

Here's an example.  This year Ascot entered into a co-mingling deal with the Hong Kong Tote for a few selected races at Royal Ascot (not the whole meeting) and the Tote turnover for the meeting was over five times higher than it had been the previous year.  I think the figures were that it jumped from £18 million to £92 million.  See what I mean?  Obviously the Hong Kong Tote is a limited opening as by law it can only bet on a set (and surprisingly small) number of overseas races in a year (and current events in Hong Kong suggest that the laws there are unlikely to become more liberal in the near future) but that's an illustration of the potential.  Here's another one: I forget the details, but it is along the lines of the French Tote currently having deals with something like 60 different countries while we currently have deals with something like eight.

And there don't appear to be any hidden pitfalls.  The great thing about Alizeti is that it genuinely has been set up with racing's best interests at heart.  Alex Frost really did not have to do this.  He's a very successful businessman who wasn't short of ways of using his time or earning a living, but he loves racing and wanted to offer his expertise to help the sport.  And it's the same with the many people who have invested in it to get it off the ground, people who have got involved because they want to help the sport.  Presumably it has been done on a commercial basis and I hope that they will see a good return on their investment, but they will only do so if the project is thriving; and if it is, then it will be generating significant sums for racing.

So that was really good.  And the whole day was really good as it was a lovely break to the routine.  Well, I say 'whole day', but 'half day' would be a better description as I worked a full morning before catching the 12.10 train to London from Whittlesford.  It had been a drizzly morning here, but it brightened up in the afternoon and ended up as a beautiful evening.  The reception wasn't until 4.00 so I had time to enjoy being a tourist.  I caught the Underground to Hyde Park Corner and then walked down through the park, past Buckingham Palace to the Houses of Parliament.  I had seen Buckingham Palace before, but not for decades, so that was a treat: ditto Westminster.

The other treat was touching a squirrel.  We see many squirrels riding through the town and on the Heath, but they're very cautious animals.  Funnily enough, only the other day we had been musing about how difficult it would be to make one tame enough to be touched or turned into a pet.  And then, much to my surprise, I found that the squirrels in St. James's Park are so used to being given food by humans that they are half-tame, tame enough to be touched.  That was a real treat, as was the sight-seeing, as was going inside the Houses of Parliament (which I had never done before) and as was attending the reception.

Tomorrow I shall be attending Wolverhampton's evening meeting.  Let's hope that I enjoy it as much - which I will if either Konigin or Sacred Sprite (pictured in the fifth, sixth and seventh photographs, on Long Hill yesterday with Ivona) can manage to win.  It's almost certain that they won't both win because they are in the same race; and it's odds-on that neither of them will win.  But it could happen.  And, if it does, Wednesday's outing, which will rank as one of my most enjoyable days of the year and when I was very fortunate to have been invited to a very special event, won't even end up as having been the best day of the week.  As always, we live in hope!