PROFESSIONAL gambler Dave Nevison has one key tip for punters hoping to make a steal at Chester races this summer – bet on the horse that has less ground to cover.

Dave, who used to make more than £100,000 a year from gambling, says the ‘tight’ nature of the Roodee track means the horses are always turning, giving those drawn on the inside a better chance.

He said: “Chester, you want a front-runner drawn low, over any distance, because the track’s turning all the time. They get the rail and then if it’s a natural front-running horse they’ve got a good chance. It’s no big secret, it just works every time.”

A former City banker, Dave became a professional punter in 1993 paying visits to the Chester course ever since.

Having written books on his ‘rambling, gambling’ life-style and worked as a TV tipster, Dave is well-known in racing circles and was approached by punters seeking advice during the course of the interview.

“Usually, it’s friendly, but occasionally when you tip horses on telly and they lose you do get the other side of it. I’m just tipping the horse, I’m not telling them to put more money on than they have got.”

One passing race fan, Bill Roberts, a former Chester resident who like Man Utd manager Alex Ferguson has read Dave’s books, alludes to the gambler’s colourful past.

And Dave accepts he has got up drunken antics in the past, especially with women.

“There’s lots of drinking and where better than Chester or York on a sunny day. There are loads of women wandering around wanting to meet a man in a suit who’s got money in his pocket.”

And the nomadic lifestyle took its toll on his marriage.

“Travelling from race course to race course, year after year, is not good for marriage,” says Dave, from Sevenoaks in Kent, who jokes that he now has ‘a very expensive ex-wife’ to fund along with private school fees for his four children.

Dave, who used to regularly bet £2,000 a race, says being a professional gambler means knowing more than the general punter who will often back the wrong horse resulting in better odds on the horse he knows has a better chance on the day.

“To be brutally honest, there are a lot of recreational punters who are not massively informed like me and they have not done a lot of studying of the form so I’m going to beat them. That’s why I love busy race meetings – lots of people going there, enjoying a day out, accepting they are going to lose, which gives me an opportunity to win.”

But for the last 15 months Dave has not laid a bet. Instead he has spent his time developing a website, www.bodugi.com, which encourages friends to bet against themselves while his company takes a 20% cut.

The venture is the natural progression for Dave, who turns 50 this year and increasingly sees gambling as a young man’s game. “I don’t want to be putting my head on the block when I’m 60-65.”

Turn to pages 56-57 for a picture special from last week’s Chester Races.