Seven visitors from Germany will have to undergo nearly eight nerve-tingling minutes tomorrow as British racing's equivalent of 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire' is staged at Warwick.
The contingent from Munich are making the trip to Shakespeare's county hoping no tragedy will befall their choice in the Tote Scoop6 Warwick National Chase.
As expected the competitive three miles five furlong handicap, televised by Channel 4, has been selected as the £1 million Scoop6 bonus race.
The German syndicate, led by British journalist David Conolly-Smith, collected a cool £917,021 as a result of their successful Scoop6 bet last Saturday.
Now the spotlight is on them as they set their sights on the bonus race; if they pinpoint the winner they will net a further £1,084,422.
Their total winnings would exceed £2m which is more than has ever been one on a single racing bet and more than has ever been won live on television in this country.
Fears that the party would prefer to watch the race from Ascot - ahead of a night on the town in London - have proved to be unfounded, much to the delight of Tote bosses.
"It's going to be an exciting day and we're looking forward to them coming to Warwick," said Tote spokesman Rob Hartnett.
"They are flying in tomorrow morning to a London airport and then will be ferried by executive coach to Warwick.
"They are going to be wined, dined and entertained in the run-up to the race."
"The selection for the big race must be made at least an hour before the scheduled off-time at 3.10.
"The choice has to be made on a secret telephone line and once it is made there is no reason why it should not be made public.
"But we are discussing exactly when this will be done with them and with Channel 4.
"I'm sure punters will be interested in the horse and it might well that the starting price will be a lot shorter than you would have expected."
No doubt the syndicate - which also includes a leading German bookmaker - will have been carefully thumbing through formbooks to try to find the winner from the 10 runners.
The probable favourite is the top-weight Kingdom of Shades, trained by the in-form Venetia Williams.
But Hartnett advised ignoring the obvious and suggested going for the Cumbrian-trained Slideofhill.
"If I was offered a shot at £1m I would throw my formbook into the bottom drawer and let my heart rule my head," he said.
"I'd go for Slideofhill, although the way he jumps won't making it easy viewing. He's trained by Jonjo O'Neill who won lots of money for me when he was a jockey."
Channel 4's self-styled punters' pal John McCririck reckons a better result for the country would be to see the syndicate selection beaten.
If the syndicate's selection does fail then the £1m bonus will be up for grabs next weekend to anyone who finds the winners of this weekend's Scoop6 races.
"Normally we all side with the guys going for the monster prize but here they've already picked up £917,000 and if they get the winner of the £1 million bonus race that will blow all our chances next week," said McCririck.
"Never have so many dreams relied on one horse failing."
Tomorrow's Scoop6 races are:
Leg 1: 1.40 Newcastle
Leg 2: 2.05 Warwick
Leg 3 2.40 Warwick
Leg 4 3.10 Warwick
Leg 5 3.25 Newcastle
Leg 6 3.40 Warwick
