KEY POINTS:
Monkey King is set to be handed the poisoned chalice of New Zealand Trotting Cup favouritism.
The exceptional Pukekohe pacer, who turns five today, is the TAB's early pick for our greatest harness race.
Not that his connections will be all that happy about being rated the top
seed for the November 13 classic.
While the TAB is still weeks away from opening the first New Zealand Cup market their harness racing bookmaker Steve Richardson has confirmed Monkey King will be the early favourite unless something dramatic changes before nominations close.
That means Richardson rates him higher as a potential Cup winner than champion 4-year-old Changeover, the last two New Zealand Cup winners in Flashing Red and Mainland Banner, Sly Flyin and even dual Interdominion champion Blacks A Fake, who is almost certain to be nominated for the 3200m feature.
"It is looking like an awesome race but if we opened the book tomorrow Monkey King would be the top pick," said Richardson.
"But it is a market with so many good horses we have a lot to work with."
The New Zealand Cup market is usually the most anticipated harness book run by the TAB, opening up to two months before the race and with so many different lead-up races it can be subject to wild fluctuations.
Take last year for example.
Flashing Red got out to $25 in the fixed odds market before paying just $4 when winning the thriller.
Early fixed odds favourites Baileys Dream, Mi Muchacho and Mainland Banner all failed to run a place or even make the race, continuing a horror trend for early cup favourites.
That same curse hobbled Mi Muchacho in 2005, the mighty Elsu in 2004 while Young Rufus, Jack Cade and Holmes D G are other pre-post favourites in recent years who have gone down, albeit narrowly.
This year's race looks particularly difficult for punters because Flashing Red and unlikely starter Blacks A Fake would face 15m backmarks, while Monkey King is hit and miss from a stand and Changeover has never had one.
"It is always a lot of fun doing the market because everybody who loves harness racing has an opinion and with so many great horses this year I expect it to be a big betting race."
Richardson says last season was a challenging one for harness racing bookmakers, with the TAB betting fixed odds on more races than ever before.
"We had some good nights and some terrible ones but I am sure it drives up the interest in the races," he said.
While he and his bookmaking partners are often maligned by the punting public the TAB accepts bets on more fixed odds races than any other similar organisation in the world.
That is obviously made possible by the fact we have no other legalised bookmakers in New Zealand but even in Australia, where there are hundreds of bookmakers, punters would have no chance of getting fixed odds on a one-win race until 30 minutes before it jumped.
Yet in New Zealand every race on a premier harness day, even maidens, is opened at 8.30am on the morning of the race, even though the TAB has no totalisator odds to compare with.
The TAB also accepts multi bets to win up to $250,000, which any Australian bookmaker at a minor meeting would laugh at you for trying to put on.
Richardson's next big job is to frame markets for the Australasian Breeders Crown semi-finals and finals at Ballarat starting on August 14.