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RACING AND SUPERSTITION How Luck Is Appraised by Men of Long Experience A I Reign of Intellectual Emotion World Wide Some Eng ¬ lish Fetish Followers It is almost proverbial that speculators imagina ¬ tive men and veterans of life and experience grow in superstition with years Seme turfmen of great ¬ ness are notable examples Such superstition is worldwide and the turf abounds in notional minds The American bookmaker is well enrolled An English writer in the Manchester Sporting Chronicle tells a tale of English bookmaking superstition about racing and its luck that is most amusing Here is part of it itIt It is astonishing how many people believe in luck but from observations extending over a long period I have arrived at the conclusion that what many backers call their lucky times are merely the occa ¬ sions upon which the averages are adjusting them ¬ selves selvesTo To make my meaning clear let us assume that all races consist of but two runners and that the betting is absolutely fair even money against each horse This of course is equivalent to spin ¬ ning a coin and betting upon the result so as an illustration I will give the exact details of the spinning of a penny twentyeight spins resulting as follows HTT TTT TTTII1 II II II T H T H H H H H T H T TIn In the ordinary course of events provided the average consistently maintained itself the coin should have fallen head and tail in consecutive order but in the example I have quoted it took twentyeight spins before the average was adjusted in its proper proportion half and half By the time I had spun the coin twentyeight times It will be seen that heads H turned up on fourteen occa ¬ sions and tails T on fourteen occasions also alsoNow Now had a backer set out to support tails he would have met with what he might call a lucky run of eight consecutive wins starting from the second spin and when he subsequently ran up against a sequence of four losers quickly followed by a further sequence of five he would naturally call it his unlucky period and no doubt tell his friends that he absolutely couldnt do right rightTHEMUSIC THEMUSIC OF CHANCE AND CHARMS CHARMSIn In the first fourteen spins it will be seen that heads won four times and tails won ten times In the second fourteen spins tails won four times and heads won ten times so if we take the two sections one against the other we find that the averages compare favorably favorablyHad Had the example been worked out upon races of two runners each the resultant would have been practically identical and much about the same tiling occurs in races where there are more than two runners and the prices vary When a backer runs up against an abnormal sequence of losers he can rest assured that the future will produce an equally abnormal number of winners not neces ¬ sarily in sequence but in sufficient numbers to level up the averages according to the prices or odds oddsIn In other words he will have periods when he cant do right and periods when he cant do wrong These lie will call his lucky or unlucky periods as the case may be yet there is really nothing lucky or unlucky about the matter at all allWith With the object of bringing the lucky periods more into the picture many backers arc in the habit of carrying mascots which are I suppose about as lucky as catching scarlet fever The superstitions indulged in by many of them are al ¬ most incredible incredibleOne One of our big professionals who cannot by any means be classified as being a fool so far as the magnitude and success of his operations are concerned swears by the following square of num ¬ bers which he has had engraved upon a disk of eighteen carat gold 0 32 3 34 35 1 7 11 27 28 8 30 19 14 10 15 23 24 24IS IS 20 22 21 17 15 25 29 10 9 20 12 30 5 33 4 2 31 31He He is a firm believer in the luckbringing pro ¬ pensities supposed to be attached to freak numbers such as OfiO 222 etc and it will be noticed that his talisman square always produces 111 whether the columns are added horizontally vertically or diagonally from corner to corner The numbers run from 1 to 30 30CHARM CHARM OF HIEROGLYPHIC CHART CHARTAnother Another big man in the backing world carries around his neck in a small silk bag a piece of parchment upon which is inscribed some weird x and wonderful hieroglyphics He does not pretend to know what they mean but lie is quite sincere in his belief that it has brought him the most ex ¬ traordinary luck since he has worn it itStill Still another big operator I am friendly with is in possession of a piece of loadstone or mag ¬ netic iron ore to which he attributes most ex ¬ traordinary powers and avers that the luck it brings Mm is quite phenomenal Certain it is that during the past few years lie has accumu ¬ lated a fortune approaching 250000 but I am inclined to believe that his success is due to his own sterling judgment and facilities for obtaining useful information rather than from any influence exerted by his precious mascot mascotThousands Thousands of backers pin their faith to the lucl supposed to be attached to racing plates from horses that have won races Those off Shaun Spadah fetched 5000 when recently put up for auction for charitable purposes They were cer ¬ tainly lucky for the charity that benefited Jade rings and tiepins Egyptian scarabs and small pieces of coal are other mascots I have happened across all carried by people who are certainly old enough to know better The coal however may come in handy and prove lucky if the strike lasts long
