Womble brings me down to earth…
… with a bump!! Ouch!

It is never a surprise in dog racing when the outsider wins; Womble, trap 4, won at 25/1 and left the bookies smiling. Its price was 50/1 ante-post earlier this week.

It was first out of the traps and was never headed. Fear Me, trap5, ran into 2nd position with Droopys Sami 3rd. Although it had improved its time the race wasn’t a particularly fast time. It was 29.39 secs. I’m sure we will hear more about this dog, though.

I couldn’t make up my mind on this race and ended up backing Droopys Sami and Farloe Hobbs.

I decided I would risk 7 points on this race using a Dutching Calculator to work out what I should put on each dog.

A Dutching Calculator can be accessed at ‘Tools’ on www.oddschecker.com

This is how it works:

My two selections were priced at 15/8 and 3/1.

The first thing to do is to change the fractions to decimal and add 1 (for the stake).

So, 15/8 = 15 divided by 8 = 1.875. Then add 1 = 2.875.

Next : 3+1 = 4.

Enter 2.875 in the first field of the calculator; and then enter 4 in the second field.

Enter the total staked, 7 points, in the Total Staked field

Press the button marked Recalculate and the calculator shows the stake required for each selection that will return the same amount no matter which selection wins.

In this case I wanted a 5 point profit so my stake was actually 4.32 points on the 15/8 shot and 3.11 points on the 3/1 dog. If either selection had won the return would have been 12.43 points; which included the 5 point profit.

The calculator will take up to 12 selections in horse racing and it can be used in football bets if, for instance, you fancy that a certain team won’t get defeated, but you don’t know whether your team will win or draw, then you can bet it for a win and a draw with the Dutching Calculator and return the same profit; either way.

The Sheffield Steel City Cup was a big let down for me and for most of the punters but at least it gave me the opportunity to talk about the Dutching Calculator…

Come racing!!