Paul Jacobs, racing tipster for the Daily Star Sunday, can certainly pick a winner.

He has just become champion tipster in a competition run by the Racing Post.

Mr Jacobs — who got the betting bug from his late grandfather Jack Davies, a warden of Liverpool’s Princes Road shul — won the contest for flat race naps. He has won it for jump racing three times before.

When he raised a triumphant fist after watching the last race in a St John’s Wood betting shop, staff gave him “a very funny look,” he said, “as I was the only customer in the shop and I hadn’t actually put a bet on