Homeless man bets £3 on the Melbourne Cup and walks away with a house and beers

6 months ago 47

A HOMELESS man who bet £3 on the Melbourne Cup has walked away with a house deposit and a load of free beers.

The New Zealand Herald reported the man, known only as Robert, stuck $5(£3) on the first four finishers in the ‘race that stops a nation’.

No one could catch Zahra on the awesome Without A Fight[/caption]

Without A Fight was the 7-1 winner with 17-2 Soulcombe second, 150-1 Sheraz third and 25-1 Ashrun filling fourth.

His tiny punt returned a whopping £51,250 – which he only discovered when remembering to check his account while having a cigarette after the race.

Robert, who has been living in a garage in Wellington for the past nine months, said he refreshed the page three times to make sure it was right.

He said: “It was quite an emotional process, mate.

“I couldn’t believe it, and I thought to myself, ‘there must be something wrong here’.

“So, I went into my easybets and realised that there was a green tick next to my $5(£3) first four easybets with $106,000(£51,250).”

He said punters at the working men’s club where he placed the bet bought him some drinks and gave him his own mini Melbourne Cup with flowers inside.

Asked how he would spend the money, he said he is determined to now turn his life around and get a place of his own.

He said: “I’ve gone from being homeless, sitting in a garage to finally being able to afford a deposit on a house now.”

Winning jockey Mark Zahra was doing his own hardcore celebrating in the aftermath of his amazing win.

Without A Fight ran out an easy winner, with red-hot pre-race favourite Vauban stuffed into 14th spot.

Zahra – who branded himself an ‘idiot’ for his winning celebration – is famed for his partying and when asked how his head was the morning after on a live TV interview said: “If you never sober up, then your head’s all right!”

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