Attendances and on-course betting rise in Ireland with HRI confident industry 'facing up to any number of challenges'
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Irish racing attracted a marginal increase in attendances across last year, leading to a rise in on-course betting.
There was a 0.5 per cent increase in reported attendances to 1.242 million in 2024, with on-course betting, including the Tote, rising by 4.5 per cent to €84.1m.
The number of runners on the Flat decreased by 2.3 per cent to 15,800, while jumps runners were up by 0.4 per cent to 17,443, with the average field size across both disciplines down by 1.4 per cent.
Commercial sponsorship rose by 7.9 per cent to €6.8m last year, with EBF sponsorship totalling €2.9m, an increase of 7.4 per cent.
The money that went through the ring at public auction bloodstock sales was down by 14.5 per cent to €197.8m, while the number of horses in training (10,488) and the number of owners (4,741) rose by 0.4 per cent and 0.9 per cent.
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Suzanne Eade, CEO of HRI, said: “The early months of 2024 proved to be very challenging with considerable disruption to the fixture list, but we can be happy that many of the significant figures bounced back as the year progressed.
“Wet weather had a telling effect on fixtures and the numbers of entries and runners in the first half of the year, while a remarkable absence of rain for a prolonged period in the autumn certainly impacted those numbers again as the return of significant numbers of horses to the track was delayed.
“However, the overall figures once more show the Irish racing and breeding industry is strong and facing up to any number of challenges. It was good to see how well the attendance figures held up despite a number of key fixtures being blighted by the weather, and betting figures recovered well, having been behind when the six-month figures were published in early July.”
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