RACE DIVIDENDS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 236, 5 October 1936, Page 9

RACE DIVIDENDS.

INDICATED ON TOTE. THE LATEST SYSTEM. OPERATES NEXT SATURDAY. Racegoers who patronise the Auckland Racing Club's spring meeting which opens at Ellerslie on Saturday will have their first introduction to the latest method of recording totalisator betting. Instead of the jiumber of tickets taken out on each horse in a race beirig shown, as in the past, there will be a huge blackboard which will indicate the dividend which any particular horse is paying at any stage of the betting. The system is not new to New Zealand, having been worked satisfactorily on several racecourses in the South. The face of the totalisator which the betting public in Auckland has observed over a long period of years will not be on view 011 Saturday next, and those people who have hitherto had to do gome quick mental calculating to get a "near enough" estimate of a dividend will now be saved this worry, as the blackboard will show to within five shillings the return at the particular moment the board is viewed. The indicator, or blackboard, extends the whole of the front of the totalisator and provision is made to indicate the dividends of 30 horses. Ralow' the number corresponding to the s horses as set out in the racecard, are numbers ranging from 1 to 150, with the spaces between each number divided into four by small white dashes as on a watch, indicating the minutes. Each of the dashes represents 5/ and the white numbers the pounds. The board is quite easily read and should cause ho confusion whatever to the betting public.

To each "horee" on tlie board is allotted a two-coloured tape, white and orange, and the ends of the colours indicate the dividends, the end of the white indicating tbe place dividend, and the end of the opaiQge the win dividend. The system is » manual one. Behind the blackboard is tfce elictrie totalisator recording the investments as they are made, and between the blackboard and the totalisator face are the operators. One man wearing earphones, and with a dividend calculator before him sits facing the totalisator face and as the amount of the investments alter he passes on to the men, also with earphones working the tapes, the amount of the dividends as shown on the calculator, and the tapes are moved accordingly. The working of the system' appears to be very simple. The dividends are indicated with all taxation deducted. It goes without saying that the operating of the indicator will necessitate fast working. Once betting begins on a race it continues, with frequent rapid changes until the betting closes. During the betting dividends will necessarily vary, but it is unlikely to any great extent and Aucklanders will no doubt prefer the new method to that of relying upon mere guesswork when estimating dividends they should receive should fancies prevail.