Sunday Racing at Nicosia...

Today we had been invited by Nicky and Mark to join them (and about 76 others!) on a trip to Nicosia Races.  Those of you who know John will know that he loves racing and many years ago we went to Nicosia Races on Boxing day with Donald Barton and his wife Maureen.  Donald is an ex-jockey who still eats, sleeps and breathes racing and it was Donald and Maureen under their Dee-Bee Racing hat who had organised this (their last trip for 2011) to Nicosia.

We arrived at Nicky and Mark's in time for Nicky to provide us with a superb cooked breakfast which set us up for the day as the journey to Nicosia is over two hours and we weren't due to eat until about 3.30pm!

We all had to assemble at City Supermarket car park in Coral Bay where two coaches were waiting to take us all to the Racecourse.  I had intended to 'frock-up' for the occasion and had dusted off the dress I wore to Ladies Day at Ascot but as it was raining and only 10 degrees when we left Droushia I opted for trousers and layers. 

We knew it would be warmer in Nicosia but having checked the forecast it did say it was only going to be a maximum of 17 degrees with a high chance of rain and with 11 races, the first of which didnt start until 2.30pm it was going to be a long day in a tent!

It is a very well organised event as the cost includes your travel, a private marquee with its own viewing platform, a very substantial lunch your racecards and tellers, plus they do not sting you on the cost of the drinks.  When we went before we were lucky enough to spend the day in the Members Enclosure but the marquee was a pretty good substitute especially when we managed to get the hot air blowers working!

Our two coaches had the marquee to ourselves so there was plenty of room to spread out.  We joined a table with Nicky and Mark's friends who made us both feel very welcome.  There was some serious studying of form from the scant information we had managed to download from the internet in advance.  Nicky was opting for the the 'nice name' or 'nice coloured silks' approach which was about as good as any other method.

On the coach trip Maureen had given quite a bit of useful information about the day and as betting is very different over here in Cyprus had suggested that we might like to try an OMNI bet which other parties had found to be more successful than others.  With this you are trying to bet on two horses which will finish in the top three.  The slip on the right was our first attempt - this was not a winning bet!!!  Returns on winning bets can be very very small because they dont have odds like we do (I didnt really understand so cant explain).  Our table suggested that all losing tickets be placed in a pot and at the end of the day a ticket would be drawn and if there was any money left from the drinks kitty then the owner of that ticket would win the money.  Let's just say that by race 11 all John's and my tickets were in that pot and everyone else had had a winner!!

It proved to be quite a cool day but we did go out and watch some of the horses in the parade ring before they raced and as the ring is sheltered it was a very pleasant spot.

They all looked in really good condition.  They are not allowed to race when it is too hot and race on an all weather surface so that it is neither to hard nor too soft and with no jumps there are unlikely to be any horrendous accidents whilst racing.  We got a good view of the horses as they set off but the viewing platform is a little way from the finishing line and so unless there was a clear winner we could often be cheering for a horse that we thought had won but had actually been pipped at the post!!

As it gets dark between 4.00pm and 5.00pm the majority of the races took place under floodlights and once the sun had gone down it began to feel chillier but as the wind decided to drop we all braved it outside for the 11th and final race which set off at about 7.30pm.  It was 'shit or bust' for John and I as we were the only ones on our table that had had no winners all day.  Unbeknown to me John had decided to go wild in the aisles and place a massive €4 omni bet rather than just the usual €2 we had placed in the ten previous races - there was a lot of pride at stake here if nothing else!!  Still you can see with such small bets we were never going to make our fortune - the highest win on our table had been about €30!!! 

Unbelievably John's bet of number 8 coming ahead of number 10 somewhere in the first three came in and he sent me off to collect the winnings - at this stage I didnt know how big a bet he had made and I was expecting to pick up around €10 tops so when the teller gave me €82 I thought John was have put our villa on it!!  His €4 came good because for some reason that particular combination had high odds!  Not only that one of my tickets was pulled for the leftover kitty money so that netted another twenty-odd euros so our very pleasant day had cost us nothing except the initial event cost and our contribution to the raffle where the funds all went to Cancer Support.

It was a long day as we didnt make it home until 10.30pm and the cats were beside themselves waiting for us to come home and have some love but we did enjoy it - even more so as we had a win!!