Ulsterbus punter grabs big Saturday treble

None of our local punters could match the 50p eight timer that netted an English punter a cool million last Friday, but we do have some lovely bets to mention this week.
We start with Ulsterbus driver Gerard Hackett who touched with the bet of the week. Keen punter Gerard placed a £5 each-way treble on Saturday. It was originally a quad but we will come to that later.
Gerard is a stickler for early prices, which we at the PG call a gamble within a gamble. He took all early screen prices on – and the decision paid off in spades.
His first selection, Comply Or Die, won the Eider Chase at Newcastle at 11/1 to give the bet a dream start.
Gerard had to wait an hour for his next selection to run. Rayshan was well backed in to 13/2 from 12s and won with a bit in hand.
What a sweat! Gerard already had £780 riding on his last selection and that selection was also the subject of a gamble – our sweating punter had sixes and the horse was now as low as 7/2.
The second favourite – King of Dixie, a 9/2 shot – was withdrawn at the start but our punter wasn’t bothered as he was on the sweat of a lifetime. His well-backed horse, Atlantic Story, was given a terrific ride by Jamie Spencer to win with a bit in hand.
Our punter was in punting heaven – he thought he had won £5,619.38 after a quick count by his mates. But that Rule 4 was at the back of his mind and when he went to collect his windfall he was told the bad news – he had £4,664.25 off the docket; he had just lost a fifth of the bet. It took a wee bit of the gloss off it but, still, Gerard was delighted with the bet.
Now back to the start and Gerard had originally wanted to do a quad but saw the price of his fourth selection and promptly left it out.
Riverside Theatre (5/4) was the horse and it won at the last at Kempton at 5/4 – if only...
Joe Maguire was checking the scores coming in on Saturday on Sky Sports and was left devastated after Crystal Palace beat him out of £1,500. But despair turned to joy when he checked the Irish League scores. He lifted close to £600 off his bet thanks to that late, late Donegal Celtic goal at home to Linfield that even had the Reds fans cheering.
Another Andersonstown punter hit Sean Grahams for over two and a half grand.
The punter placed 3 x £2 doubles and a £4 treble.
The bet was up in the space of 20 minutes – Gungadu got the ball rolling, winning the Racing Post Chase at 4/1. The ride of the weekend from Sean Quinlan got Stop The Show up to win at 8/1.
The sweat was on and Comply or Die, who did our bus driver a favour, didn’t let him down, winning at 11/1.
The bet paid £2,586 – a great 20 minutes work by anybody’s reckoning.
Just room for one more and this one’s a kind of good and bad luck story.
A North Belfast punter placed a 50p Lucky 31 with Grahams – a bet that costs £15.50.
His first horse, Where’s Johnny, got the ball rolling, winning at 7/2, and 40 minutes later Josear won at 8/1. When Mondial Jack at 7/1 won the 4pm at Hereford our punter had a big sweat on his hands.
It got better when Our Jim won at 5/1 (7/2 SP) to give him an almighty sweat on his last selection.
That selection, Spud 11/4, could only manage fifth place to beat our punter out of an absolute fortune.
He still picked up £1,991.80 for his troubles – that’ll ease the pain.

We at last hit a winning nap yesterday when Lupanar won at 10/11 - we followed up withe a double when Topflight Wildbird won at 9/2 a 10/1 double was almost a 88/1 treble, whe Geography 15/2 loomed up at the last only to make a bad error that cost him the race. It would have been a free Cheltenham!!
Thursday selections
NAP: Hibiki 2.10 Ludlow (will not be a big price but boost course and distance win) Isaaf 33/1 live outsider
Double: Lindsay 3.50 (good second to to Mokum last time and he has since franked the form)
Treble: Donatessa 5.30 Taunton ( good conditional jock on board and a wee bit of money for it as well)