Phantom Dollars Flood Track's Double Pool

A computer glitch linked to United Tote resulted in more than $100,000 in bogus wagers pouring into a daily double pool in late April at Plainridge Park, a Massachusetts Standardbred track.

As it stands, the six-figure mistake pales in comparison to what happened late last year at Laurel Park, where the same problem nearly resulted in more than $20 million in phantom wagers.

As it is, the Plainridge Park problem figures to hit United Tote in the pocketbook as involved tracks said the Churchill Downs Inc.-owned tote company plans to pay the six-figure settlement from the pool that was falsely inflated by the phantom bets.

According to a source with knowledge of the situation, in the first race April 28 at Plainridge two $54,546 straight wagers each showed up in the daily double pool. The two wagers made on the combinations of 1-3 and 1-4 totaled $109,092 and represented in that single pool an amount of money equal to about what the track handles on an average card.

An official from Plainridge owner Penn National Gaming Inc. said it's his understanding the wagers were not placed by any player but actually are errors linked to a United Tote glitch. A Red Mile official said United Tote acknowledged the problem traced to their system. United Tote did not return phone calls from Blood-Horse seeking additional information on the problem.

The Massachussetts Gaming Commission is looking into what happened in the April 28 daily double pool at Plainridge.

"The Massachusetts Gaming Commission is aware of this matter and it is currently being reviewed by our investigations and enforcement unit," MGC director of communications Elaine Driscoll said. "This issue was brought to our attention by both an MGC employee and Penn National."

While the wagers may have been caused by a glitch, they did register in the live daily double pool. The wagers at Plainridge, which uses Sportech as its tote provider, were listed as coming from United Tote customer Red Mile, a harness track in Lexington. Sources said after a meeting of officials from PNGI, Red Mile, and United Tote, it was agreed the $109,092 in wagers were in error and United Tote would resolve the settlement.

"United Tote did pay for the error since the money was paid out at Plainridge," said Red Mile director of mutuels and simulcasting Julie Sorrell.

That Plainridge pool error proved profitable for opportunistic players who noticed the huge overlays on every other daily double combination and took advantage. In pari-mutuel wagering, odds are determined by how much money is wagered on each horse or, in a bet like the daily double, each combination. With the massive wagers in phantom money behind just two combinations in the pool, significant overlays were listed on all other wagers.

The winning $2 double combination of 15-1 shot Tropical Trice (No. 5) in the first race and 1-5 favorite Magical Ability (No. 4) in the second contest returned $321.40—by most estimates about eight times the expected payout for the two-race wager that offered fields of seven and eight runners.

A source said the biggest winners on the double bet throiugh the rebate shop Racing and Gaming Services, where high-level players—many of whom use computer programs to scan pools for potential overlays—quickly noticed the opportunity and fired about $17,000 in daily double bets into the pools.

While United Tote looks like it could suffer a six-figure hit, the glitch could have caused a larger financial burden and public relations nightmare late last year when millions of bogus dollars poured into a Laurel superfecta pool, inflating it to $24 million.

Maryland Jockey Club vice president of wagering and simulcast operations Dave Scheing said the mistake was caught by track officials and MJC tote provider AmTote and corrected before actual wagering began. He said the MJC and AmTote still have not received an explanation of what happened from United Tote.

"I still have the paperwork on my desk," Scheing said of the uncompleted report on the problem.

With most superfecta pools at the Laurel fall meet collecting less than $30,000, if such an inflated pool had not been noticed—depending on how the wagers were made—it could have resulted in listed payouts that may have reached $1 million or more because of the error.