With apologies to the late, great Tom Petty, even the winners can get unlucky sometimes. Just ask horse racing bettor Jeff Arthur, who connected on Remington Park’s Sooner 6ix bet on April 10 only to find out he would not get the entire jackpot payout due to a dead-heat.
The lure behind the “jackpot” Pick 6 bet is to take down the whole pool a bettor must have the lone winning ticket combination on that racing card. Arthur placed a series of wagers making sure his tickets did not create overlap. One of the bets cost $403.20 creating 2,016 combinations since the base wager is 20 cents.
According to Racingthinktank.com, Arthur’s ticket was the sole winning one on the card. The pool was $35,145. However, when Arthur checked his account he saw he had received $8,920.
What say horseplayers?
Instead of getting $35,145, @RemingtonPark tells player that deadheat invalidated single-ticket win despite no rule to the contrary, and sweep of consolation pool proves single ticket. Jackpot's STILL 😱there tonight! Read HERE: https://t.co/MZmKMoFDdI pic.twitter.com/GdKTwJWiM8
— Thoroughbred Idea Foundation (@racingideas) April 16, 2020
How could that happen? The winning ticket is below:
Ticket (winners bolded): 5,7,9 with 1,5,7,9 with 1,2,3,6,8,9,10 with 1,5,8 with 3,5,6,7 with 3,10
The fifth race saw Southern Lips and Apollitical J Rebel dead heat for win. Arthur had the 5 and 7 on his ticket, which eventually proved to the only winning one. However, Remington Park claimed “to Arthur and his representatives that the occurrence of the dead heat created two separate winning tickets. Remington further affirmed that he would have won the jackpot if he used only the 5 or the 7, but using both of them created two winning combinations.”
So, Arthur had one winning ticket with two successful combinations due to the dead heat. Hence, he claims the ticket was unique and the Thoroughbred Idea Foundation, a non-profit think tank aiming to improve the prospects of Thoroughbred racing, agrees.
TIF Founder and Chairman Craig Bernick:
“The horseplayer picked all six winners, he was the only person to pick all six winners and they were all on the same ticket. If either horse wins by a nose, he has it. If he picks one or the other, he has it. Its unconscionable that the track is making this judgment. There is nothing in the rules that state this should not be a unique payout. On a judgment call, the track decides to favor itself over the customer. That’s bad for business, bad for horseplayers and bad for racing.”
TIF Executive Director Patrick Cummings added, “Remington indicated they were not in a position to pay Mr Arthur for his win, and re-asserted he ended up with two tickets and does not get the jackpot payout of $35,145. There is no rule on the books to adjudicate this situation. Common sense says, if either horse wins by a nose, Mr Arthur wins. Remington says that if Mr Arthur had one horse in the dead heat instead of both, he wins. But they’ve decided, and the tote settlement agent reported back, that he does not win. Mr. Arthur has indicated he will file a formal complaint with the Oklahoma Horse Racing Commission and pursue the matter beyond that if he does not obtain payment.”