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Ironically, Bondi Icebergs, a haven for punters with more expertise and enthusiasm than Racing NSW and the Australian Turf Club put together, at present harbours a cooler of legendary status.
In fact, Wick rates with Hard Luck Hal, Billy the Mock, and Andy Vincent, all of whom had reputations of being able to stop the Orient Express and, more particularly, racehorses.
The "gift" was emphasised in The Cooler, a film starring William H. Macy whose mere presence at a Las Vegas gaming table could freeze the best winning streak of a patron, thus turning a loss into profit for the house.
At least one Sydney rails bookmaker is benefiting from Wick's best bet, laid at a considerable profit.
"The only problem is he has switched to value [longer prices] and not the red hot favourites I prefer," he divulged, wanting to remain anonymous in case other bookies catch on to what seems to be a lucrative ploy.
Wise guys are saying that if David Walsh, who built a museum in Hobart with proceeds of the punt, had access to Wick's tips he could add another wing.
Now it's not lack of judgment with Wick, just bad luck, similar to what afflicted Hard Luck Hal, who once went to Queensland to sell swimming pools and sent the state into one of its worst typhoons. Circumstances, too, always played an adverse role for him with racehorses.
Like the 1985 Golden Slipper when Hard Luck Hal took the long odds with illegal pre-post operators about an Adelaide two-year-old, New Atlantis, which later firmed to short odds. The bookmakers informed him the week before the Slipper that he was "not on", to save disappointment should it win.
Hard Luck later took close to even money with legitimate operators, figuring New Atlantis was a certainty. New Atlantis should have scored but was unlucky.
Billy The Mock had a long and distinguished career of stopping good things, a situation also with Andy Vincent, once the deputy race caller at the Sydney tracks and Harold Park. Favourites just wouldn't get up when he broadcast the race. But Wick isn't restricted.
He predicted Srikandi was an outstanding sprinter, but when he tipped the mare twice to the bookmaker, she was beaten. She won the other three, creating another outburst from the Iceberg team, Lofty, Tim, and Billy, who as a youngster, did Don Scott's settling in the high-flying Legal Eagles era.
At pool level Neil Rogers, handles Betfair with the same aplomb as his swimmers, including Eels great Peter Wynne, appreciating the switch to Bondi after the Parramatta River and progressing like a Channel contender.
Obviously Dr Clive Allcock, the shrink specialising in gambling, would benefit from a session at the Icebergs, as long as he didn't interrupt the cards, played in the most perfect conditions overlooking the pool.
No doubt the Icebergs team would be well placed on the racing's controlling bodies. Like those holding office they don't go to the races – because there are no poker machines there.
Lofty at noon on Friday, interviewed attempting to get a belch out of a bandit, stressed his week depended on a Casino dog event run later in the day.
Which leads me to The Dapto Chaser, epic Aussie theatre by Mary Rachel Brown at the Stables – King's Cross not Royal Randwick – required watching for His Honour, Michael McHugh, who holds the guillotine, at the coming inquiry into the greyhound shenanigans in NSW.
Certainly the ATC would prefer to have today's Canterbury meeting at Randwick for the more social setting rather than a better surface for horses.
The Stables bar at Randwick is featured in the film, Rubin Guthrie, with Chris Waller and Ron Quinton, having cameo roles in which Jack Thompson, the actor not the jockey, maintains the excellent form first seen to advantage with Norm Erskine in Wake In Fright.
Thompson had a belly full of booze and backed a winner in Rubin Guthrie. Canterbury today, starring Hugh Bowman, James McDonald and Blake Shinn, is more for the purists like Wick with a strong support caste who follow the doctrine of the only time you are beaten is when you stop.
