The Magnificent Seven

Fülszöveg

T WAS, SAID THE TIMES, the equivalent of a racing driver winning every Grand Prix, or a golfer scoring straight birdies in the final round of the Open to finish with a hole in one. No-one would have believed it could happen but, on Saturday 28 September 1996, at Ascot racecourse, the impossible did. Frankié Dettori won every single race on the card: a Magnificent Seven.
Now, to mark the fifth anniversary of that extraordinary day, Graham Sharpé telis the full story of how history was made. For this is a tale of losing as well as winning - on a comparably epic scale. Dettori's seven wins cost Britain's bookmakers L40 millión. For them it was more like the Wall Street Crash. Sharpé should know: as William Hill's Media Relations Manager, he had the bitter-sweet experience of presenting one lucky punter with a cheque for more than half a millión pounds.
The Magnificent Seven, therefore, follows that day from its innocuous beginnings, hour by hour, race by race, through to its... Tovább

Fülszöveg

T WAS, SAID THE TIMES, the equivalent of a racing driver winning every Grand Prix, or a golfer scoring straight birdies in the final round of the Open to finish with a hole in one. No-one would have believed it could happen but, on Saturday 28 September 1996, at Ascot racecourse, the impossible did. Frankié Dettori won every single race on the card: a Magnificent Seven.
Now, to mark the fifth anniversary of that extraordinary day, Graham Sharpé telis the full story of how history was made. For this is a tale of losing as well as winning - on a comparably epic scale. Dettori's seven wins cost Britain's bookmakers L40 millión. For them it was more like the Wall Street Crash. Sharpé should know: as William Hill's Media Relations Manager, he had the bitter-sweet experience of presenting one lucky punter with a cheque for more than half a millión pounds.
The Magnificent Seven, therefore, follows that day from its innocuous beginnings, hour by hour, race by race, through to its unbelievable climax when Fujiyama Crest just held on by a head to win the 5.35 at 2-1. There is the amateur footballer in Lancashire who, to his wife's disapproval, put L69 on Frankié to win every race - and the cleaner from Lincolnshire who passed up the vitai extra 50p for an accumulator bet as just too extravagant. There is the on-course bookie who at the last minute escaped ruin by going to Worcester rather than Ascot, another who chose Ascot and finished up having to sell his house, and the inside story of how, as events unfolded, the big betting chains took desperate precautions to avoid the same fate themselves. There are recollections by all racing's major figures, from television's Peter O'Sullevan, John Francomé and Clare Balding to pundits and personalities like John McCririck and Barry 'the Bismarck' Dennis. And above all there is the charismatic figure of Frankié Dettori himself, 'the first rock 'n' roll jockey', who the night before had confessed to his fiancée 'a bad feeling about Saturday' -and ended the next day a superstar.
A story of prodigious sporting achievement, an equally prodigious betting heist, and a day that changed many people's lives for ever, The Magnificent Seven is an enthralling and unique sports book.
ISBN 1 85410 800 X
L9.99 Vissza