New Bets from Tote Ireland

Cantoris

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Tote Ireland are delighted to announce the introduction of not one but two exciting new Tote bets in January 2011.

Firstly on January 9th 2011 at Leopardstown’s MCR meeting Tote are launching the “TOTE PICK SIX” – a six leg Jackpot type bet which will be run at one Irish race meeting on all Sundays and throughout major festivals such as Punchestown and Galway. The aim will be to pick the winners of races 1 to 6 and the “TOTE PICK SIX” pool will be guaranteed. We are starting with a €20,000 guarantee on January 9th.

The unit stake for the Pick Six will be €1 with a 0.50c minimum. The dividend will be declared to €1. Look out for plenty of free bets and promotions at Leopardstown on Jan 9th as part of our launch.

Later in the month we are reviving an old favourite – the “Tote Daily Double”. The new “Tote Daily Double” will be launched at Thyestes day at Gowran Park on January 20th 2011. The bet involves picking the winners of races 5 and 6 in a double and will be run at every Irish race meeting thereafter.

The unit stake for the Daily Double will be €5 and will increase in €5 increments. The dividend will be declared to a €5 stake. On January 20th we will guarantee the initial pool for €5,000 and will have a number of free bet promotions at Gowran Park. If there is no winner the pool will rollover to the next Irish raceday.
 
Once again Tote Ireland living in the dark ages. A 50c unit for the Tote Pick Six is too high. It should be 10c increments. If I pick two horses in each race that's 64 units @ 50c = €32. Not a bet I will be doing every meeting. If they dropped it to 10c units I would put in around €10 at each meeting which would give me 64 units @ 20c = €12.80.
 
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The object of the 50c is to get rollovers generated, which is understandable. I could see myself and a few mates having a good cut at a decent rollover. They need to get ball rolling by setting fair, potentially loss making guarantees in the early rounds, either by guaranteeing a fixed pool, or guaranteeing that it reflects favourably against an SP accumulator.

While I understand why they are doing it, personally I'm with you, I'd prefer the 10c unit option.
 
The object of the 50c is to get rollovers generated, which is understandable. I could see myself and a few mates having a good cut at a decent rollover. They need to get ball rolling by setting fair, potentially loss making guarantees in the early rounds, either by guaranteeing a fixed pool, or guaranteeing that it reflects favourably against an SP accumulator.

Agree with the statement italicized, and while the latter part of that makes sense, I think there are legal issues with guaranteeing returns on a pool bet. If UK/Irish Tote operators (couldn't these be merged btw?) wish to attract sufficient liquidity, they need to have the balls to make the bets they offer genuinely interesting all of the time.
 
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The object of the 50c is to get rollovers generated, which is understandable.

You can still get rollovers with smaller stakes e.g. one 10c winner when the unit is 50c means 80% rolled over. And it would generate plenty of interest from the general betting public. Is the idea to look for the Harry Findlay syndicates or appeal to the general racegoer because this does not appeal to me.
 
Haven't seen regular figs but Irish pools when I was over for Punchestown were laughably small. Do they have agreements with off-course firms in Ireland for boosting the pools? I know they don't offer the facility through betfair anymore. A shortsighted and backward step imo.
 
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Ladbrokes shops in Ireland bet directly into the pool. When I was working in the shops the take up of the Irish/UK jackpot and Scoop 6 was non-existent. Irish punters are obsessed with the placepot and no other tote bet gets off the ground. When the jackpot does get big, as Cantoris rightly points out it appeals to the biggger players and not the smaller punter.
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Haven't seen regular figs but Irish pools when I was over for Punchestown were laughably small. Do they have agreements with off-course firms in Ireland for boosting the pools? I know they don't offer the facility through betfair anymore. A shortsighted and backward step imo.

Win and Place pools at Galway are gargantuan on the Friday evening (have seen over 100k in the pot for a poor 2-y-o maiden) - but I couldn't agree more with you in general.
 
I would agree with the 50c min unit - you could get some monster roll overs which will generate income for Irish racing - last big roll over was in November where the pool started the day at 40k odd and grew to almost 200k as I remember - that's 50k alone in one scoop - your average man on the street can still have a crack for small money at a big pot! Look at the coverage the scoop six gets when the roll overs happen. Not a huge Tote fan but this is a step ( belatedly ) in the correct direction.
 
You can still get rollovers with smaller stakes e.g. one 10c winner when the unit is 50c means 80% rolled over. And it would generate plenty of interest from the general betting public. Is the idea to look for the Harry Findlay syndicates or appeal to the general racegoer because this does not appeal to me.

I guarantee you you won't be able to resist the first time it hits 100k? 200k? 500k? Where will be the tipping point for you C?
 
I guarantee you you won't be able to resist the first time it hits 100k? 200k? 500k? Where will be the tipping point for you C?

How often will it get to that level though? What makes the scoop six so popular is that you have big field handicaps, a huge number playing it and by week three you could have a big pot. For the Irish scoop six, you will have two maidens, a small field conditions race and a a couple of handicaps. Not as attractive to those putting in the big money (can you imagine it during the summer when you have seven unraced two year olds in the first leg) and not attractive to me who only wants to put in 20/30 units (two or three in the first leg would be required unless you fancy something). I will be abstaining from this bet completely until the Tote cops on that it is missing the likes of me completely. I irregularly did the Jackpot and managed to win €500 last year for a tenner bet. But I only do it two or three times a year and won't bother with this bet unless part of a larger syndicate and I can't see the rollover getting to 500k very often. Maybe I will be proven wrong but in current times I think this is another own goal by the Tote which is a pretty poor organisation overall.
 
I guarantee you you won't be able to resist the first time it hits 100k? 200k? 500k? Where will be the tipping point for you C?

Interesting question re the tipping point etc.

I have never placed a scoop 6 bet and it is a very long time since I did the jackpot. They essentially are of no interest to me.

However regarding the increase in the size of the jackpot, I am not sure how much more enticing it would be. The chances are that you would increase your stake significantly in order to try and win the bigger prize. In addition, with far more people doing it, including syndicates, the chances of the jackpot being shared when it is won, would also increase significantly.

Through a combination of both of these, the lure of a large jackpot would not be huge, as the prize is very likely to be diluted when it is won.
 
The Jackpot has been in serious decline in Ireland, largely because the Placepot has become the more popular bet. Here are tote betting figures for the Christmas meetings:

Leop
28 Dec Jackpot €22k Placepot €41k Total €504k
29 Dec Jackpot €21k Placepot €30k Total €568k
30 Dec Jackpot €23k Placepot €28k Total €256k

Limk
28 Dec Jackpot €1k Placepot €15k Total €89k
29 Dec Jackpot €2k Placepot €15k Total €98k
30 Dec Jackpot €1k Placepot €17k Total €81k

At the smaller meetings the jackpot pools are miserable, and because they don't reach a critical mass, there is a serious chance that, even if you were to win it, you would be cheated compared with the odds payable for an SP accumulator on the same horses. Presumably this Pick Six bet is an attempt to address that problem, by limiting it to the main meeting(s) each week and guaranteeing the pools.
 
Even those placepot figs are poor compared to lower class meetings in Britain. Irish Tote needs big shake up. With uncompetitive SP margins a big opportunity for them. To an outsider looking in anyway.
 
After the inaugural Pick-6 went unwon today, Dryden Geary of Tote Ireland said: "The bet did well today on its first try, and overall the Tote has had a very good day." He must have misread the pool, which was a desperately poor €5,700. If they can't get more than 6k in the pot for the launch of this bet, it might as well be scrapped immediately.
 
I didn't go, but I thought they were giving out free €6 bets on entrance. If that's the case

1.Most of the €5,700 must have been free bets
2.There must have been a whole heap of people who didn't even bother despite getting a free bet.
 
Rory,

I was at Leopardstown today, and to be honest apart from the fact that there was an advert on the front page of the RP I wouldn't have known about the Pick 6, the marketing of this was very poor IMO.
 
In fairness, the UK Tote deliberately brought back the jackpot to compete against the Scoop6 because of "popular demand". Numpties, the lot of them.
 
The Irish jackpot is on races 3-6, the new bet is races 1-6.

I heard Geary on the phone behind me after the first and it was as if he was clapping himslef on the back. Marketing for it was ridiculous. He came on 5 mins before the off of the first to inform us we needed to find six winners, said there were loads of Tote girls handing out €6 vouchers and there would be huge interest from the UK!! How did I miss the Tote girls.....let alone miss the €6 voucher they were stuffing in my hand.

As I said before, the Irish Tote is a complete joke of an organisation and this once again proves it. The one note of caution on the new bet is that their target is the Hennessey meeting so maybe they will throw in a €50k guarantee and make it interesting. I still won't do it though.
 
The Irish jackpot is on races 3-6, the new bet is races 1-6.

I heard Geary on the phone behind me after the first and it was as if he was clapping himslef on the back. Marketing for it was ridiculous. He came on 5 mins before the off of the first to inform us we needed to find six winners, said there were loads of Tote girls handing out €6 vouchers and there would be huge interest from the UK!! How did I miss the Tote girls.....let alone miss the €6 voucher they were stuffing in my hand.

As I said before, the Irish Tote is a complete joke of an organisation and this once again proves it. The one note of caution on the new bet is that their target is the Hennessey meeting so maybe they will throw in a €50k guarantee and make it interesting. I still won't do it though.

I think you just might C!! :whistle:
 
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