Around half of the people who bet on the biggest betting race of the year are getting short-changed and the British Horseracing Authority need to help sort this out
The creaky old starting price mechanism should be under fresh scrutiny following Saturday’s Grand National, when the SP over-round (which shows the notional profit margin built into the collective odds) came to 163%. That is only slightly less than the 165% of 2015 that provoked fears of once-a-year punters being ripped off and led to a lengthy review, which waved away those fears in a complacent-sounding report.
And so, what a surprise, here we are again with identical concerns and no official body inclined to do anything about them. Sophisticated punters, such as you, dear reader, do not take the starting price when having a bet on National day in the shops but many still do. I’m told that about half of betting shop bets on the National are made at SP, so a huge number of people are getting short-changed on their return on what may be their only point of contact with racing in the entire year. Do we want these people to have a good experience that might draw them back or are we content to leave them feeling they have not been well treated?
Related: SP system works well despite Grand National concerns, report claims
Redcar
2.00 Great Dame 2.30 Private Secretary 3.00 International Man 3.30 Sameem 4.00 Reloaded 4.30 Duke Of Alba (nap) 5.00 Champagne Rules
5.30 Paradise Papers