Tall tales

The schoolyard wager has long been a way of testing not only your opponent's chutzpah but also their integrity in keeping their word. While most sensible people lose the urge to engage in 'proposition' bets by the age of ten, those with money to burn still relish the chance to gamble not only their cash but their dignity in ever more rash or ridiculous attempts to get one-up on a rival.

Cue Virgin tycoon Richard Branson. Back in December 2009, the flaxen-haired billionaire bet Malaysian entrepreneur and Formula 1 boss Tony Fernandes that his Virgin Racing team would do better than Fernandes' Lotus in the coming year's F1 championships. It didn't. One year on, our Dickie's forfeit is to dress up as an air stewardess and serve drinks on Fernandes' airline AirAsia, with tickets on the 13-hour flight from Stansted to Kuala Lumpur being sold for £4,500 and all proceeds going to the Virgin Unite non-profit organisation for charitable causes.

Sir Richard was due to take to the air in skirt and heels on 1 May, but the flight was postponed because (rumour has it) he'd encountered an 'unfortunate mishap on the ski slopes', and was categorically not chickening out. The flight has now been rescheduled for 4 July.

Branson is one of many with more money than sense to indulge in 'prop bets' and it's no recent phenomenon. Legendary professional gambler Amarillo Slim from Texas became notorious for setting seemingly ludicrous high-stakes challenges and coming up trumps (beating Evel Knievel at a round of golf with a hammer was one of his more famous coups). Or how about the American blackjack player Brian Zembic who ended up with 36C breast implants (and liked them so much he kept them) in 2006, thanks to a $100,000 sweetener.

With undisguised joy Fernandes says, 'As an AirAsia flight attendant, Richard will have to comply with our grooming standards, and that includes shaving his legs.' Branson is taking perhaps the biggest risk of all by offering the chance to do so to the highest bidder in a charity auction. The starting price for the privilege is set at £400,000. Odds are that BA's CEO Willie Walsh will offer top price for a full Brazilian.