KEITHDUGGAN/Sideline Cut: Betting is not a mug's game. It is the indisputable art of the true genius.

Take yesterday, in a city bookmaker's indistinguishable from all others - disarmingly polite staff, terrible ventilation, an astonishing collection of midget pens and always, always, a morose man that grumbles away unheeded - where around 100 of us gathered to watch Istabraq make history.

On big race days, every Irish person wakes up and suddenly fancies himself as something of a squire, blue-blooded and steeped in equine lore. The temptation to have an old flutter is all but irresistible, and over a lordly breakfast the going is earnestly studied, the form is expertly perused and then the favourite is inevitably and cluelessly backed.

Not only are there novice hurdles in racing, there are also novice gamblers. We, friends, are the suckers born every minute, and despite our best efforts, we give ourselves away the moment we enter a bookie's territory. (Stand in the corner and watch the turf accountant's eyes go 200-watt whenever the once-a-season betting man walks through the door).

In this particular establishment, the going was smoky, the form quite nervy and, of our betting congregation - wild bunch that we were, comprising grannies, bankers who had just stepped out, young fellas, cool looking old gents with brilliant hats - about 40 per cent were strictly novice.

Novices never look totally natural in bookies and our efforts to appear so are often excruciatingly embarrassing. For instance, it just isn't done to stare at your yellow slip with its lame, 10-quid wager and smile at your madcap devilry, confirmation that there is life in the old swashbuckler yet. And don't laugh at John McCririck's jokes either.

The great thing about bookie shops is that the real inhabitants - rakish charmers with intelligent eyes who effortlessly blend in and smoke like black-and-white movie hoodlums - don't pretend that we really, well, don't belong here. We are given honorary membership to the club, permitted to invest the same emotions in a race on which they could easily bang out a thesis, allowed to passionately cheer on a horse whose name we can barely spell but whom they have been studying for years, and to collect our paltry winnings with an enigmatic poker face, as if we never lose.

The most pleasurable part of being in a bookie's is the few seconds before the race starts, when the crowd has settled and the anticipation is rising and everyone - novices, regulars and downright addicts - looks as if they have just placed every red cent they ever possessed on the outcome. Of course, it is quite possible that several in the congregation have done just that, and there is an undeniable kick in being close to such risk. Part of the fun is trying to guess whose actual future rides on this.

It is safe to assume that of our congregation 90-95 per cent had bet on Istabraq, despite the short odds. Some of this probably had to do with romantic patriotism, a wish to make a few pound on the darling horse that was about to replace Red Rum as the standard racing question in all pub quizzes. But most of it was because he (She? It? Novice's pardon required) was damn well supposed to win.

Or if not win, then at least reward all the lukewarm caution mongers who had him each way. Or at the unspeakably grim worst, to finish just outside the prizes after a gallant and heroic race which somehow transcended all the compromised cash and reminded us, one last time, of his brilliance.

What was definitely not supposed to happen was for the commentator to inform us all - with an inappropriate excitement in his voice - that Istabraq had been pulled up.

Shortly after inquiring what "being pulled up" meant, this novice entered a brief but heartfelt state of depression based on an acute feeling of betrayal. Those feelings could hardly have cut more sharply had the previous five years been spent cleaning out Istabraq's preferred place of residence in the off-season.

The commentator noted that the retired horse - our horse, mind, our flesh and blood, the reason we were all gathered here - had been given a standing ovation by the appreciative crowd at Cheltenham. Sad to say that our collective salute was not quite so noble. In fact, it went something like this.

"He's not, he's not . . . Ahhhhhh . . . s**te," was the first reaction.

"That's bloody that," was the follow up.

Silence, emphatic and disbelieving for quite a few seconds.

"I don't f***in' believe it. Useless fecker. Shoulda had Geos."

"I could break JP's effin' neck."

"F***" (repeat x 50).

Sentiment, see, has no place in the heart of the betting man. We are sharks, instinctive and primal. We are coldly professional for the duration of the race. We collect. Of course, at that moment, we novices were sharks with big blubbery tears in our eyes, feeling cheated and foolish and useless now that our immediate interest in the race had ceased. The real people in the bookies handled the mishap with a wry smile and an especially philosophical drag on their cigarette and quickly grew absorbed in the race for its own sake.

"Go on the Arch. Go on the Arch," roared someone from behind.

("To hell with the Arch," was the silent response of all novices. "I want my money back.")

When all was said and done and some horse who sounded like a particularly pretentious savoury pastry had won, there was nothing much to do except leave, with the same inglorious gait as Istabraq himself had bowed out.

And the unhappy looking man who had been privately grumbling away intensely through all the drama made to exit also, but not before stopping off at the counter to collect. Hadn't even the grace to smile. But then, he knows he has the touch, the genius. He is the breed apart and there was at least one of his kind in every bookie shop yesterday.

The rest of us, friends, are just losers.