Mark Read interview on Wolfden....Outstanding talk.

rustyh · February 2023

:-bd <:-P =D> =D> =D> =D>

Been watching these interviews and really enjoying their talks, but this is an absolute ripper.

:-bd

Check it out and tell me its not a great yarn.

\:D/ =D>

thefalcon · February 2023

great to see you pop your noggin above the trenches, rustyh.... =D>

i'll watch it in 3 segments.

bookielover · February 2023

Thanks for posting Rusty, And welcome back. I hope you are well.

Iv'e known Mark for a long time. The last time I spoke to him was when he lived in Collins Street Melbourne, and I haven't seen him since then. I know he suffered a stroke, but he appears to have recovered very well.

The two Melbourne punters he refers to, who I knew well, Michael Pitt and Wolf Fink, were bigger over a longer period of time, than Kerry Packer ever was,and they bet with my dad and every bookie on the rails.

I recall one day at Moonee Valley when Fink who,with his brothers, were the biggest carpet manufacturers in Victoria, lost half a million. And that happened more often than not. Pitt was the much smarter punter of the two.

Pitt made all of Coles hosiery, mainly panty hose, under the Embassy Brand. His turnover over a 55 year period would have to have been in the billions, when converted to todays values. I know one year, he told me,dad and a few others at a lunch we were having, that he'd turned over 35 million, for the year. He was going to 4 meetings a week and the betting rings were strong for that period. That was around 1980.

Some may think the billions figure, to be an exaggeration. But when you convert past values to todays, it isn't. We were all, about 15 of us, around a big table, bookies and punters, having a drink at the Victorian Club back in1975. Tall tales and true about the old days, were being related, and me as a 25 year old, was listening in awe,to Albert Smith, Australia's biggest doubles bookie who laid the 1966 Caulfield Melbourne Cup double to Mabel Read for $250,000 and had the commission for the Even Stevens double which wiped out a lot of bookies.

Jack Langley,a bookie who was on the Flemington rails in 1928 and who held a thousand pounds a race at a time when a house cost 200 pounds. was there. He was in his early 80's but had a mind as sharp as a tack and a great memory to boot.

He told us about probably the biggest bookmaker ever to field anywhere if you convert yesterdays money to todays. That bookie was Bob Jansen. He never refused a bet, and never backed back with other bookies, no matter how big a bet he took.

He lost 40,000 pounds, on Phar Lap's Melbourne Cup. He laid 5,000/4,000 on the track, but had laid 6,000/1,000 a few months earlier. The horse started at 8/11 and he kept laying it all the way down.This, in the depression. Try and calculate what 40,000 then would be worth today. and that's on one race. There are some stories about him on Trove which you can look up.

Jack said that he was working next to Jansen in 1932, the height of the depression. There were no bookie boards then, they came in to being in 1948. Bookies used to call the odds. All except Janson. You approached him and asked for a price.

He said that John Wren sidled up to Bob, asked him the price of a horse, and Bob said 10/1, Wren said 30,000/3,000. Bob nodded, the bet was recorded, and Jack said, it was done so quietly and quickly, that no one other than me, Bob, his clerk and Wren knew about it, because he didn't back it back. The official starting price of the horse was12/1.

But back back to Pitt. He told an amazing story about the 1942 Melbourne cup won by Colonus.

He had backed another horse to win 25,000 pounds. He's sitting in the Club, and talking to four bookies, when one said to him, I'm trying to lay Colonus. it's 12/1 and I can't lay it. Pitt said I'll have 1,000/70 if you give me 14/1. The bookie said, why don't you have a decent bet.

This was a time when the racetrack was awash with black money from black market trading of hard to get goods because of the war, and bookies were cashed up from punters who had money, and only had a few race meetings to bet on,because of the war. For example, Caulfield was turned into an army base. Pitt was making a fortune from the stocking factory and was in the middle of a big run on the punt.

Pitt said, o.k.5,000/350.They bet fractions back then, and did, until those bloody decimal odds came in and now the dollar odds. Hearing this, the other bookies chimed in. You can't just give him a bet and not us they said, so he took 5,000/350 off the other three. Then Wallace Mitchell, Victoria's biggest bookie at that time, sauntered over and said you can have, $10,000/700 off me. Pitt, never one to refuse a challenge, accepted. To cut a long story short, every bookie there at that time on that day, laid Pitt at least 5,000 to 350. By the time he'd finished, he had backed the horse to win 70,000 pounds. I had lost control, he said, but I had to cop it sweet. I really didn't like the horse, but when they challenged me, I had to accept their challenge. It won.

There were many more stories, but they will keep for another day. The fact is, as Mark was saying, those days are gone. You can't get on anymore. Kingsley Bartholomew, a big punter by todays standards, was bemoaning the fact that turnover on races on Betfair is down by half. Punters like him need the liquidity to make it pay.

Just a couple of more things about Mark. He's a nice bloke, a very switched on bloke, but he had an enormous ego. Everything was too small for Mark. He appears to have mellowed in that way, and spoke very well. The interviewer should have done a bit more research. Mark laid the biggest bet at Flemington in a long time of $1000,000/10,000 Desirable to win the 1977 Newmarket, to Bob Robertson a big South Australian punter. It made headlines at the time. Robertson was getting all the Hayes mail and was pretty deadly when he bet. It would have been interesting, for me, anyway, to hear about that because I believe that Mark challenged Bob to have the bet.

On his ego. He says that when in 1988, he moved from the Sydney Interstate ring to the local rails, he "only" held 25 million for the year. I can't think of too many sole trader businessmen who turned over 25 million in their business in 1988. His ego spurred him on to always want more. To be the biggest. I reckon every on course bookie in Australia that's still left operating, would love to turn over 25 million, and that's 35 years after he did it, and the money has lost half its value if not more. That statement of "only 25 million", really says more about Mark, than anything else he said.

This may sound contradictory, but I'm not having a go at him for it as such. Just trying to be factual about the bloke. He was ambitious and he took the risks to achieve his dreams. Did he? I doubt it, only because of what didn't succeed, rather than what did. But at least he had a go.

Everything Mark said about the situation today is100% correct and Iv'e been posting about it here from time to time. The racing powers that be, totally lost a generation of punters because they wanted them to bet off course rather than on, even though they got a bigger percentage return from the on course tote. The Corps will not let you on if you are a winner. Eventually every prediction Mark made in that last 10 or so minutes of that interview, will come true.

rustyh · February 2023

:-bd <:-P

Im going great thanks Falc.
Back on track after my heart attack.

Lost a big chunk of it but stent, pacemaker/defibrillator combo are working a treat along with a dozen tablets a day.

Awesome yarn BL. Love those old stories of the glory days.

Talking about Kingsley , check this one out. Another ripper interview.

SLIPPERGOLDEN · February 2023

Brilliant contribution BL and great to know you have a heart Rusty :D

bookielover · February 2023

Rusty, you sound like the six million dollar man. It's amazing what medical science can do nowadays. The secret when you get a heart attack, is to survive it. If you can do that, as you have, they can patch you up with stents, or by passes and insert defibrillators which they couldn't do even 10 years ago, as far as I recall. I reckon that even with everything they have done, you probably feel better than you have in a long time. So onward and forward, and plenty of winners ahead.

bookielover · February 2023

SLIPPERGOLDEN said:
Brilliant contribution BL and great to know you have a heart Rusty :D

Thanks Slip.

When I recall the stories I heard, and the joy of going to the track from about 1965 until 2000 with my dad, I really lament what has happened in this country to the on track experience. I'm not having a go at any on course bookie, but they are there nowadays to earn.

The days of the gambling bookie are over. They might bet you 8,000/500 each way at 16.00, but only if they can lay it back on Betfair at 21.00 or better. I don't blame them. They do it, because they can't work up to that bet, through on course money,and if not for Betfair, they wouldn't be able to back it back,and would be standing the horse for too much.

The bookies during my fathers time, 1957 until 1990, were gambling bookies. Mark Read mentioned Syd Hill his uncle. We were great friends with him, and his wife Marcie. His son Andrew holds a top managerial position at Crown Perth. If Syd didn't like one, he'd stand it out the gate. My dad was the same. And there were plenty of others.

Just by way of an example, here's another story, this time about us. We were working on the rails at a very ordinary winter midweek meeting at Flemington. They don't have them now to save the track.There was a full compliment of bookies on the rails, and the first row opposite was full so around 45 bookies working as I recall. A smallish crowd, but all of them were die hard punters, including the usual collection of professionals.

Seven races went by, and we hadn't won on a race. Some small losses, some big. Dad was losing around $40,000 and cursing under his breath as to why he'd allowed himself to get so involved in a very ordinary program.

There was a 5/4 favourite in the last, considered a certainty by most on the track. My father said to me, bugger this. Got up on his stand and put up 7/4, when only one other bookie had it at 11/8.

First bet was to Michael Pitt, $14,000/8,000. Then an Italian fruiterer, had $6,000 cash on it. There was a lot of money in fruit in those years!! Another pro, had $7,000/4,000, and then Reg Withers who owned the franchises in Australia for Seven Elven and was a huge punter, had $21,000/12,000.

Anyway, he got $52,000 out of the horse in about three minutes, laying $91,000/52,000 in total.and turned the horse off. I remember looking at the book and seeing that figure and for some reason, even though my dad layed bigger bets and stood to lose a lot more on other races, this particular race and day, has always been etched in my memory. I thought its sardines for a month if this wins.

My dad did not lay a bet against another horse. He said, I either get out winning $12,000 less expenses, or they carry me home. The horse started at 6/4, and ran fifth. A 14/1 chance led all the way and won. That was one of the good endings. There were plenty of others that weren't.

Punters like Pitt, would run up and down the rails and you could back a horse depending on the meeting to win a million. I remember bookmaker Bill Graham laying Tawrific the Melbourne cup winner in one bet on course to a punter who may still be alive so I won't name him, $500,000/25,000. That was1989.

Bookmaker Mike Faulkner laid the owner of Campaign King, Gabe Farrah, who also owned Better Loosen Up, $250,000/50,000 at a Saturday meeting at Caulfield. It won. Unfortunately for Gabe, with all the great horses he had and the huge winnings on the punt, he won an absolute fortune in Japan on Better Loosen Up when it won the Japan Cup, he died broke, owing one bookie, two million dollars.

You could get on for plenty in Sydney and the Gold Coast ring was one of the strongest in the country.

And then, by about 1995, it all ended. many of the big punters passed away, many went broke, and there were no new ones coming through to replace them. Bookmaking became for many, unviable, but, having said that, a lot of the bigger ones, couldn't adjust their thinking to a lower turnover regime. My old man, because we had another business and he appreciated every sale we made, could, and did. Syd Hill, couldn't and gave it away and, among other things, became a commission agent for Sean Bartholomew.

Anyway, I always loved hearing the stories of the past, and feel that I'm lucky to have known and met bookies and punters who were around from the 1900's till well into the 1980's and some longer, and I had the opportunity to hear their recollections first hand.

I have posted this before, but I really enjoyed my time in Perth over the Pinnacles Carnival.

Even though attendances were way below what I thought they would be, and there was too much noise surrounding the bookies ring which made it impossible to hear an Interstate race, there was a great atmosphere in the ring itself,albeit with only the six bookies. It brought back just a little of the memories when betting rings everywhere exploded with excitement. i hope we are well enough to come back this year.

SLIPPERGOLDEN · February 2023

Okay BL when are you releasing your book of Turf Tales? Terrific stories.

curmudgeon · February 2023

What is loud & clear from the Read conversation is the warning that racing is being cruelled from within.

Breeders, Trainers, Administrators & Corporates forming tight knit enclaves to place a glass ceiling on punters winning via opportunity cost & worse.

There must be conditions for a broader base of winners rather than a narrowing of the success

to a few major concerns.

Read has never lost his ability to be aware of necessary basics for the the game & those within it to broadly thrive...and he recognises it now is a relatively closed shop in Australia on track.

His mention of the AI / MCHugh issue & his disdain for V'Landys & his travelling medicine show really is music to any sensible ears in the discussion of the corrosive overall effect of too much vested interest.

The Hong Kong angle for punting value is the kicker....in the sport of kings it turns out that to support a viable punting cohort ....a socialist approach to on track competition has proven the most successful. Narrow base excesses have become the enemy of racings existence....if you can't see that "it's made round to go around" then perhaps the echoes of ever diminishing numbers of solitary feet shuffling away from the racetrack will assist in the realization.

Rodent · February 2023

Why do people use Hong Kong as an example? Last time I was there I think the only form of legal gambling was on the horses and maybe soccer.

Imagine how well Australian racing would be going if for decades there was no sports betting other than soccer, no pokies and no casinos. No trots and no dogs. So if you want to gamble, it's horse racing, soccer or the lottery.

bookielover · February 2023

SLIPPERGOLDEN said:
Okay BL when are you releasing your book of Turf Tales? Terrific stories.

I need a few more to pass on to the big racetrack in the sky, before I write a book. Mind you, I've got to hang on myself :))

Yankee · February 2023

Amazing how many of those big hitters died broke,i read Bill Waterhouse"s biography and he tried coming across as Mother Teresa!

JayJay · February 2023

Bill's rose coloured glasses introspective of an auto biography belongs in either the fictional of the fairy tale section of the library, a self flagellating pile of sanctified dross.

thefalcon · February 2023

correct jayjay, the whole family reeks to high heaven.

Bushbookie · April 2024

Yep Jay Jay , the part of Bills book that still gives me the absolute detesting of him is how he describes how he got an exemption from Army service during WW2 because he was studying Law . Fair enough tolerated that but then he descibes how easy and great it was chasing and tarrying women around Sydney in his sports car when most of the men his age was serving overseas . He was gloating and skiting at how easy it was to court and romance women due to the shortage of Aussie men in Sydney .

JayJay · April 2024

There are so many other parts of his pile of self flagellation that invoke a similar response....talk about revisionist history and gilding the lily......sickening.

G'day Punter!

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Mark Read interview on Wolfden....Outstanding talk.

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