mick56
1st February 2010, 07:07
It was reading about this guy professional backer alex bird that first fired up my interest in the possibility of making profits from backing race horses.
Not the desire to emulate him but rather that it could be done.
At present times when the racing media are constantly lecturing us on the necessity of obtaining value via lateral thinking!,alex appeared to practice this as well as preach it.at his peak during the 50"s,he was one of the first to recognise the potential of race times,and as there was no electronic times available he employed his own staff to attend every meeting with a stop watch and put this information to very good use.
Even being ahead of the crowd he still worked to very small margins avg 4% but with a yearly turnover of millions,in the days when we had real money,in fact the introduction of the 4% on course tax virtually put pay to his operations,but by this time he had made enough money and hung on to it that it did not matter.
I remember reading an interview where he said that dispite his huge success he still became almost physically sick before each bet.and i though only a guy who has already arrived could feel comfortable with making such a confession.
And so i felt he deserved his place in this hall of fame.
Not the desire to emulate him but rather that it could be done.
At present times when the racing media are constantly lecturing us on the necessity of obtaining value via lateral thinking!,alex appeared to practice this as well as preach it.at his peak during the 50"s,he was one of the first to recognise the potential of race times,and as there was no electronic times available he employed his own staff to attend every meeting with a stop watch and put this information to very good use.
Even being ahead of the crowd he still worked to very small margins avg 4% but with a yearly turnover of millions,in the days when we had real money,in fact the introduction of the 4% on course tax virtually put pay to his operations,but by this time he had made enough money and hung on to it that it did not matter.
I remember reading an interview where he said that dispite his huge success he still became almost physically sick before each bet.and i though only a guy who has already arrived could feel comfortable with making such a confession.
And so i felt he deserved his place in this hall of fame.