LANDLORD Jim Hughes and his pals took the bookies for £50,000 in a well-planned coup at Ayr races.

Celebrations at Uncle Jack's pub in Lower Darwen were in full swing over the weekend after his stayer Good Hand had won at 7-1.

And Jim boasted: "It was like a dream. Everything went according to plan. I told everyone the horse would win."

Good Hand had been claimed out of Bill Watts' stable early in the summer after it had won a race and it was sent to Steve Kettlewell, the very shrewd Middleham trainer.

Watts was livid at the claim - he had had the gelding for eight years - but Jim and Steve had already planned the September coup. Jim recalled: "I paid for the horse in readies. I had taken a Morrisons carrier bag stuffed with used tenners to the course and I just plonked it down and took the horse."

Good Hand then ran unplaced three times on the Flat during the summer but the team placed it to win a couple of hurdle races recently at Cartmel and Perth "just to keep it fit."

Those wins did not affect its Flat handicap rating and, as that came down, the stable confidence for the Ayr race went up.

Said Jim: "I got 8-1 from local bookmakers on the morning of the race and then I hit William Hill on the course. Steve also had a packet on. And so did a lot of the pub regulars and our pals." The £5,000 first prize and the magnificent Eglington & Winton Challenge Cup was just the icing on the cake.

Good Hand may go to Pontefract in a couple of weeks but the handicapper will have stuck on a few pounds for the win and a fourth successive victory might be asking a bit much.

Plans to challenge for the Cesarewitch, the big autumn handicap, are likely to be shelved. Instead Jim might offer the horse back to Watts.

"We've had our fun with it. We'll let him buy it back," he grinned.

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