Why preservation of the betting ring is of paramount importance

A very different perspective on an afternoon’s racing came last Thursday when I stood on the rails for a couple of races with my chums from Olympic Racing, who have a very decent betting pitch at Goodwood.

Needless to say your correspondent was not given anything serious to do like trying to balance the book. All that was needed was to take the money, call the bet back to my boss John Sutton, who punched a button and a ticket would immediately appear for me to hand to the punter.

For each race you are given a wedge of tenners and fivers for change and as soon as the board was taken down for the off this float was whisked out of my paw by John in case I sneaked off to the champagne bar.