Redhands bring home the bacon

Phew!! Had a very hectic day today but just managed to beat the deadline to keep the blog up to date before the clock ticks over to Tuesday.
First of all hats off to the Redhands of Tyrone who brought home the bacon at tasty odds of 15/8 in the All Ireland gaelic football final yesterday against Kerry.
It was a nip and tuck battle until the final four or five minutes when a few late scores tipped it in the Ulstermen's favour to end a very successful season betting on the Irish national sport, it will certainly remain in my roster for next year. The other GAA sport, hurling, though didnt quite see the same kind of returns but hopefully can turn the corner on that one next time around.
Started off this morning with frantically trying to get all the Grand Prix snooker qualifying bets on at Sporting Bet, they only had the prices up for less than an hour and they were constantly fluctuating within that period. Won a few quid early in the day but gave it back with some of the later results unfortunately, no real damage done though.
Have also gone in tomorrow morning with a few bets in what look fairly unappetising betting matches to be honest and will be happy to eek out a few quid. Still have to price up the afternoon matches which I may yet do before I go to bed.
Also gotta sort out my car cd player and get that mended this week, sending it off to the original manufacturers who sell a repair service on ebay; was going to replace the model until I saw second hand ones going for over a hundred quid!!
Also been changing my antivirus on the computer - had to go back and do a custom install as it was taking about five minutes to load a webpage, not to mention the telly going on the blink - so its all been a bit of a pain!!
Managed to squeeze in a trip to Nottingham greyhound track tonight for the first time, have been to the racecourse for the gee gees there many times but thought I'd test the water given my big success on the Irish dogs last weekend.
Unfortunately, things didnt go so well tonight though, only had three bets but they could only manage fourth, third and second so maybe, looking at that particular trend, I should have stayed on for the last race instead of making an early exit!
My main fancy was Boherbradda Mac, the Scurry Cup winner who was an odds on favourite, but he got checked at the first bend and as it was a sprint race, the winner had flown by the time he stayed on into second place; he still qualifies for Saturday's final at the track though, but won't be playing at those odds again in a hurry!!
It seemed a bit eerie with no on course commentator and just seemed to lack a bit of atmosphere with few people venturing outside due to the rainy weather plus only three bookmakers in a little room inside who seemed to be involved in a stand off with the punters most of the night. In fact I hardly saw any money change hands apart from mine, there were just a few cries from the back of the room from people who were betting on tab by the looks of it.
This was only my third ever visit to a dog track, I first went to the now defunct Blackpool track and then to Yarmouth, both while on holidays, seem to remember a rather eyecatching buxom wench serving behind the bar of the latter venue rather more than what actually happened with the dogs that night, but better move swiftly on, I think I've been reading too much Nevison in the RFO!!
While on the subject of the dogs, added a few to my portfolio for the Irish Laurels after the second round - Almighty Jack (10/1), Cabra Cool (33/1) and Chicken Supper (66/1, plus a few quid at 100/1) to go with my original selection Slip The Lark. The system of adding a few impressive runners at this kind of stage seemed to work well in the recent Irish Derby, even though I hit the jackpot with one of my original picks as it happened.
Hopefully with this approach can go into the final (which is being shown live on Setanta) with a very strong hand at decent prices, thats certainly the way I like to play the dogs rather than betting at shortish prices when there's always a lot of trouble in running.
Will be continuing to price up the snooker this week which runs through until Thursday, and there's also a trip down the road to Derby for me with live Premier League Snooker on the same day as the conclusion of the Grand Prix qualifiers.
The Belgian Open I mentioned yesterday was won impressively by Ricky Walden who beat Graeme Dott 4-0 in the final, it really is time he managed to produce this kind of form in a ranking event as he seems to be a prolific winner of these minor tourneys.
Dave Harold continued his good run with a place in the semi finals (defeating Mark Selby on the way); Stephen Maguire was the other semi finalist.
Anyway, better get on with those remaining prices for tomorrows snooker
See you soon
Rick