Punter bags second big payout at Ellerslie

A punter who won almost $800,000 on the Ellerslie races celebrated at the casino and plans to fly his best mates to Las Vegas.

And he promises to "reinvest" at the TAB after his second big win in little more than a year.

On Monday the man, who did not want to be named, placed a $2850 boxed multi-bet over six races.

He picked all six winners and won $776,245 – a record fixed-odds payout by the TAB.

But it came down to the wire, with his final pick, Tanha Strike, winning by a head.

"I was yelling and screaming ... once it hit the line I think the neighbours were just about ringing the fire brigade," he said, having watched the races from his Auckland home. "It was just an outburst of happiness."

The 37-year-old Aucklander said it would have been a good day if three of the six horses had won, but picking all six was an "unreal feeling".

He celebrated by going to the SkyCity Casino and putting a drinks tab on for his friends and Tanha Strike's winning jockey, but he "didn't spend a cent [gambling] on the casino".

He had a few plans for the winnings: "I'll be reinvesting in the TAB – you can't bite the hand that feeds you."

And a gambling trip in June for six of his best mates. "We are going to Vegas for a week or so, it'll be a bit of fun."

It is his second big win. Last year he won $260,000 in another multi-bet. "But this one just blew that one out of the water."

However, he was quick to point out that he'd been on the end of many losing bets, saying "there's always more hard-luck stories than good ones".

The keen gambler analysed the race book, selected his horses and chose 57 lines at $50 each – covering all combinations.

New Zealand Racing Board chief executive Andrew Brown said it was the largest fixed-odds payout since the first bet was taken in 1950. The next biggest payout was in 1990 of $619,000.

There had been only two other payouts of more than $200,000 for the multi-bets – one to the same man who won on Monday. Multi-bets let you wrap many combinations into one bet, and multiply the odds, increasing the potential winnings.

- © Fairfax NZ News