Ted Puts His Money Where His Mouth Is
Think twice before you bet against Ted Forrest, he will do whatever it takes to win.
Especially when it comes to proposition bets, those wacky wagers in which one pro bets another pro he can't do a particular task.
Mike Svobodny bet him $7,000 he couldn't run a marathon, 26 miles, on the 4th of July in Las Vegas.
It nearly killed him, but Forrest got the money.
"I was playing tennis with Mike and I was in the mood to punish myself because I had just lost $250,000 in a huge pot-limit Omaha game," said Forrest. "We were discussing a bet for me to run a marathon, but we couldn't agree on the terms. The next morning, which was the 4th of July, Mike called me up and said if I would run the marathon on the UNLV track starting at noon that day he would bet $7,000 that I would quit before I finished.
"Still in the mood to punish myself, I accepted the bet. When I got to the track I saw that it was made of red urethane rubber. Mike had gotten the weather report before he made the bet and found out it was going to be a scorcher.
"Temperatures reached 117 degrees that day but with the sun radiating up off that red urethane track it actually was hotter than that.
"I won that $7,000 bet, but probably went through $100,000 worth of misery in the process."
Another time, Huck Seed bet him $10,000 that Seed's brother Leif, a runner who did a mile in 4 minutes and 12 seconds, could walk from Los Angeles to Vegas only sleeping twice.
"This seemed like an easy bet to take as I thought Leif was built for speed rather than distance," said Forrest. "As it turned out, Leif had to abandon the bet after about 70 miles when his Achilles tendon became too sore to continue."
Forrest bet Howard Lederer $30,000 he could beat him in tennis even though he let Lederer have the doubles alleys.
Forrest netted the 30 grand.
He once bet hefty Howard that he couldn't "cross weights" with thin Huck Seed. Howard would have to lose enough pounds to reach Huck Seed's weight and Seed would have to gain enough to reach Lederer's weight.
"I think they had a year to do it," he said. "Howard lost about half the weight he was planning to lose, but they didn't come close because Huck played so much basketball that he actually lost a few pounds during the course of this bet."
Ted gained $50,000 on that wager.
He bet 5-foot-5, 200-pound Mark Weisman $60,000 against $10,000 that he couldn't run a 6-minute mile.
"Mark got down to 145 pounds and ran the mile in 5 minutes and 50 seconds to grab that 60 dimes," said Forrest.
About 10 years ago, John Hennigan bet Forrest he couldn't drink 10 beers in half an hour.
"He offered me 100-to-1 odds," Forrest recalled. "I took the bet for $300. I won $30,000 on that one. The next day I was so sick it almost wasn't worth it."
Last but not least painful, Forrest bet David Oppenheim that he could bench press 225 pounds 50 times in one day.
"I tore my pectoral tendon on that bet and had to go to the emergency room. I lost $10,000 and suffered a career-ending injury."
The only time you might win against Forrest is to bet against one of the players he backs in poker.
"The running joke is that you have to be a lame horse to be in my stable. And there is some truth to that. I probably have done worse than anybody in the history of gambling backing players. Without mentioning any names, four separate players that I have backed lost over a million dollars each. Oh, well, live and learn. I used to have a problem turning people down if they asked me to borrow money or to stake them. At this point in my life I have learned to say no," said Forrest.