The quickest Tennis serve on record

The fastest tennis serve ever recorded in a competitive match was a mega fast opener by former #1 ranked tennis player Andy Roddick (America) in the semi-final of the 2004 Davis Cup. The shot speed was confirmed at 155mph. His opponent was Vladimir Voltchkov.

The most Grand Slam tennis titles won by a man

Roger Federer is current King of Grand Slams – with 16 under his belt. Previously American Pete Sampras held this record with 13 Grand Slam titles (1990 and 2000).

Most Grand Slam Tournament Singles Titles Won by a Woman

Margaret Court (AUS) has this amazing record with an astonishing 24 Grand Slam singles titles. Court also has won 19 Grand Slam doubles titles and twenty one mixed doubles Grand Slam titles. A statistic which will surely stand for a long time.

Most lifetime earnings in Tennis

$62,000,000 in career earnings by Roger Federer to date. “Pistol” Pete Sampras booked $41,994,440 between ‘88 and 2001.

Longest Tennis Match Ever

The ATP Wimbledon Tennis Championship was the venue of the longest tennis game in history, between John Isner (America) and Nicolas Mahut (France). The match duration was eleven hours and five mins and set a few records. The fifth set played for an arduous eight hours, 11 minutes, and set a new record for the most games in one set, at one hundred an thirty eight. John Isner took the record for the most aces served in a match (with 103).

Most Wimbledon Final Defeats

Former #1 tennis player Chris Evert holds the unlucky record for the most Wimbledon final defeats – she lost six of seven finals against Czech Martina Navratilova.

Highest Career Win/Loss ratio

US tennis champ Chris Evert’s total career win–loss ratio in singles matches of 1,309–146 (.900) is the best ratio of any pro player in the history of tennis.

Shortest grand slam final ever

Was the 1988 French Open, when ladies’ tennis player Steffi Graf smashed Natasha Zvereva 6-0, 6-0 in only 32 minutes.

What is your favourite tennis world record, and why is it memorable?

The Grand National is one of the biggest events in UK horse racing betting, and definitely one of the most exciting and exhilarating races of the year for fans of the sport. As you might expect, Twitter is awash with people looking for Grand National tickets!)

Now is the time to do your homework, to work out who you are going to bet on – and also which free-bets or special offers you might take up when you bet (bookmakers run massive promotions during the National).

Our grand national betting tips below will help you to identify some possible winners, and give you some interesting Grand National triva and history along the way.

Understand the Race

The Grand National is a steeplechase – this term refers to the long distance a horse must race over, as well as diverse ditch and fence obstacles.

Picking a Winner in the Grand National

• Lots of Runners: With 40 horses in the race you can certainly expect a spectacle. That’s a lot of legs! It’s quite common to see riders falling and horses running without jockeys.
• Track Length: 4.5 miles: It’s a long track.
• Balance & Jumps: Horses with history of falling are not likely have confidence and to maintain their composure to stand a realistic chance of winning.
• Stamina: This is a long race – horses with no track record of wins on tracks over 3 miles are more unlikely to win on a 4.5 mile track.
• The race is synonymous with the racehorse “Red Rum”which was trained on the beaches of Southport and went on to win 3 Grand Nationals, capturing the nation’s hearts.
• Each way betting – placing an each way bet on the grand national is an easy way to make profit, as bookmakers pay four places on each way bets as standard
• It is not very common to find a horse in the race with such short odds that you won’t make a profit with an each way bet, should the horse place 1st-4th

Grand National Free Bets

Bookmakers are more than happy to acquire new customers by offering free-bet offers during popular sporting events such as the Grand National, Wimbledon etc.

Check out our Free bets page for over £600 in free bets for the 2011 Grand national.

2011 Cheltenham Festival Schedule

The Cheltenham Festival 2011 gets off to a start on 15th March, and ever the race schedule is awash with interesting contests. Pundits will be glued to Kauto Star against Imperial Commander, and Big Buck’s is looking unstoppable in the World Hurdle after a red hot winning streak.

Tuesday March 15th

13:30 Supreme Novices’ Hurdle
14:05 Irish Independent Arkle Challenge Trophy Steeple Chase
14:40 Festival Handicap Steeple Chase
15:20 Stan James Champion Hurdle Challenge Trophy
16:00 Glenfarclas Cross Country Handicap Steeple Chase
16:40 David Nicholson Mares’ Hurdle Race
17:15 Centenary Novices’ Handicap Chase

Wednesday March 16th

13:30 National Hunt Steeple Chase Challenge Cup
14:05 Neptune Investment Management Novices’ Hurdle
14:40 RSA Steeple Chase
15:20 sportingbet.com Queen Mother Champion Steeple Chase
16:00 Coral Cup (Handicap Hurdle)
16:40 Fred Winter Juvenile Handicap Hurdle
17:15 Weatherbys Champion Bumper (Open NH Flat Race)

Thursday March 17th

13:30 Jewson Novices’ Steeple Chase
14:05 Pertemps Final (Handicap Hurdle)
14:40 Ryanair Chase
15:20 Ladbrokes World Hurdle
16:00 Byrne Group Plate Handicap Steeple Chase
16:40 Fulke Walwyn Kim Muir Challenge Cup Handicap Steeple Chase
17:15 St. Patrick’s Day Derby (Charity Race)

Friday March 18th

13:30 JCB Triumph Hurdle
14:05 Vincent O’Brien County Handicap Hurdle
14:40 Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle
15:20 totesport Cheltenham Gold Cup Steeple Chase
16:00 Christie’s Foxhunter Steeple Chase
16:40 Martin Pipe Conditional Jockeys’ Handicap Hurdle
17:15 Johnny Henderson Grand Annual Steeple Chase

The next big horseracing calendar event in the UK is the 2011 Grand National.

A bonus whore will usually only return to one of the poker rooms they have whored if they are given a reload bonus (equivalent to added rakeback for a month), or if the poker room is particularly soft.

Bonus Whoring Considerations

• Rakeback: If you can get rakeback and clear it at the same time as your deposit bonus, you are getting more than just rakeback.
• Bonus Release Rate: When unlocking bonuses, it is desirable to get the lowest possible irelease rate to unlock your bonus – or at least a reasonable rate. Raking $50 to clear $10 in bonus is not-unreasonable.
• Multi-Tabling: It’s often essential that you can multi-table with ease to hit the targets required to unlock your bonus. Desirable features on a site which you may bonus whore on are: traffic, pokertracker / holdem manager support (to track bonuses/raked hands etc).
• Rake Races: Rake races offer the potential to win additional prizes as you grind, depending on the amount of rake you generate and your position in the leaderboard during the promotion. Some sites run monthly rake races. Visit Rake Race and sign up for the mailing list for monthly rake race promotions.

Where to Get Poker Bonuses

Many poker sites offer especially larget poker bonuses and rakeback to savvy players through dedicated sites. Remember that you should always make a suitable first deposit to ensure you are eligible for the maximum permitted bonus when you join a site for bonus whoring. Check out our resources below to get you started.

Poker Bonus Whoring Resources

• Bonus Whoring – Guide to bonus whoring, featuring the best poker deposit bonuses and Poker Loyalty Program Schemes.
• Poker Loyalty Program – Poker loyalty program site, offering loyalty and deposit deals for sites on iPoker, OnGame, Fulltilt, Boss Media, PokerStars and more.
• Rakeback – Rake360 Rakeback offers rakeback and VIP deals for most online poker rooms, deposit bonuses, and a selection of juicy rake-races.
• Rake Race – site offering rake-race information and mailing List,
  keeping you up to date with new rake-races.

Discuss Bonus Whoring in our Poker Forum

Rake is how poker rooms make their money. That is the money that the poker rooms deduct from every pot. Usually the rake is a couple of percent with a cap at around $3 at the highest limits. There is also rake on tournaments, where the large portion of the buy in goes to the prize pool, and a little fee goes to the poker site. The poker rooms make huge money from the rake the players contribute with. It is not unusual that a single player pay $3000 to the poker room every month, and that’s just one player. A poker room with more than 10,000 active players earns quite a lot of money to say the least.

What is Rakeback?

Rakeback is a refund to the poker player.. Poker players receive a percentage of the rake they pay to the poker room. A normal rakeback offer is between 25% and 40%, but sometimes players can get an even better offer. If you receive 35% rakeback, and rake $1000 one month, you will get $350 back. The more you rake, the more you get back. Some sites offer what they call a “poker VIP Bonus“, which to the player is equivalent to rakeback.

How do I get rakeback

If you want to get rakeback you have to sign up at a poker room through a special link (which lets the poker room know that they must give you rakeback (as normal players do not automatically get rakeback). Some sites offer multiple rakeback deals (e.g. Poker Rakeback Deals. All of the poker site links on this page entitle you to rakeback when you join the poker room.

A referring rakeback site earns a couple of percent of your total rake back, but the major part of it goes back into your bankroll.

Some of the poker variations are better suitable for a rakeback deal. If you play shorthanded poker, you are involved in more pots, and therefore pay more rake (and can potentially earn more rakeback). If you play at more than one table at the time you also play more hands, and pay more rake. When you are involved in a lot of pots you should definitely play with rakeback – otherwise you are really throwing away a LOT of money unnecessarily.

There is no downside to rakeback – you will earn a lot of extra cash, or save cash depending on how you look at it. Just do it!

Rake Races

A rake race is a competition to rake more money than anyone else on a particular poker site in a given timeframe. Rake Races either count the number of hands you rake, or the value of the rake from the hands which you have played.

Rake race leaderboards pay out 20-50 people usually, sometimes even the top 100 raking players are paid.. so there is plenty of incentive to play (however just like a tournament payout structure, the bulk of the money to be won is at the top of the ladder). The prizes are lucrative, with some rake races paying up to €30,000 to the winner!

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Rake Race Information

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