Escape to a magical place from the comfort of your own room

During one of the wettest winters in recent times, with swathes of the world’s population confined to barracks in the middle of a global pandemic and the domestic industry mired in scrutiny, Dublin Racing Festival IV feels like a timely intervention.

Leopardstown boasts its own little microclimate these days, a situation that has at different removes been both a blessing and a curse when it comes to ground conditions.

It might be a stretch to extend the Foxrock venue’s status as an impermeable urban principality to an idyllic racing destination given that only essential personnel will be in attendance, but for two days racing fans can lose themselves in a bit of escapism from the comfort of their own homes.