Enable © Photo Healy Racing
Racing officials can take a rather 'a la carte' approach to racecourse attendances. Pointing out that racing's overall figures put it second only to Gaelic games is hardly comparing like with like but it's a point still made. Nevertheless there seems to be a contrary official trend towards portraying crowd figures as a rather old-fashioned measure of the sport's appeal in a multi-media digital subscription market where every click can be precisely calculated. However attendance levels still count as an important measure of one intangible but vital sporting element - sentiment.
They help indicate racing's appeal in a purely sporting sense, serving as some kind of indication as to how much of a lure the core product - that boiled down appeal of horses and jockeys competing against each other - actually is in terms of the general viewing public. That is especially important on those major days when racing sets its stall out to try and entice as many of that public in as possible.
When HRI's chief executive Brian Kavanagh pointed out after 'Irish Champions Weekend' that it is wrong to use attendances as a sole measure of the merits of an event he was only stating reality. It is silly to use attendances as a single measure. But it is just as silly for brass to dismiss the importance of boots on the ground in the context of commercial pictures being instantly available to everyone in this digital world.
That's largely a betting market made up of viewers interested in gambling on the sport rather than the sport itself. Twenty bullocks could gallop around Leopardstown and someone somewhere will bet on it. That's about betting and in revenue terms it's both vital and calculable.
But if that bottom line is all that counts, and should numbers paying through the gate become even more superfluous than they appear to be getting already, then racing here faces a pretty fundamental reappraisal of itself.
The sport in Ireland has always prided itself on its roots in the public consciousness to an extent unlike anywhere else. It's part of the whole 'what we are' bit. The contrast to France in particular, where for most of the general public racing is little more than glorified bingo, has always been pointed out. It's supposed to be different here. But there are plenty who will tell you we are remorselessly heading down a similar road.
There are industry days on the flat in particular where such a trend is inevitable. This is betting shop fodder providing opportunities to owners and trainers and the programme has expanded so much that it is unrealistic for a country with a relatively small population to expect significant crowds to watch it. However treating attendance levels on big days especially as little more than some retro sideshow is both wrong-headed and worryingly blasé.
It's an attitude that seems to be growing however, with racecourses bloated by TV money often seeming to see their function as being to be little more than open-air studios. Yet capital investment in racecourse facilities for a public that increasingly doesn't show up continues to increase.
It's also an attitude lurking not too far underneath the surface of that regrettable but illuminating decision to keep both the Derby and second leg of 'Champions Weekend' at the Curragh. Attendances were a long way down that particular priority list. And there's a growing sense elsewhere too that efforts to entice customers through the gates is becoming an optional extra. After all what's the point when the real money's in telly?
Except it is vital to Irish racing's sense of itself, and of its merits as a purely sporting exercise, that this is nipped in the bud. Whatever the sport, it is still skulls through the gate which testify to overall health and appeal, a measure of the essential lure it has for the public.
What's worrying is how even a cursory examination of who is at many meetings reveals how many are there because they have to be. They have a stake, either through ownership or through the betting ring or some other professional capacity.
It would be fascinating to examine a thorough figures breakdown as to how many people go racing purely for its own sake. I suspect the results would be startling, maybe because many have been left disillusioned at how they're treated, or maybe because the sad reality is that such a fan base is dispiritingly small.
Failure to acknowledge that possibility, and failure to make enticing the public a priority, will be difficult to precisely and statistically pin down in future statistical examinations beloved of organisations devoted to spread-sheets. But Burke knew a thing or two about cold conservatism and even he pointed out the most important revolution of all is a revolution of sentiment. Then again he was no digital-native so hardly counts.
Aidan O'Brien has always maintained an apathetic attitude towards media fascination with him overhauling Bobby Frankel's world record of 25 Group/Grade 1 victories in a calendar year. He's had plenty of practise of course and you would think people would have cottoned on by now that his apathy is genuine. Still in narrative terms it's handy for those of us in the headline game in terms of attaching an overall narrative to a sport where the most important race is always just half an hour away.
He's got to get eight more top-flight winners before the year is out and even though O'Brien himself mightn't care too much it's hard not to think this coming weekend could be crucial. With the Cheveley Park and Middle Park in Newmarket on Saturday, and half a dozen Group 1's in Chantilly a day later, the potential is there to generate even more record headlines.
Clemme and Sioux Nation will be major players at Newmarket and it is possible O'Brien will have runners in all six Chantilly contests. He hasn't ruled out one of the Moyglare fillies - Magical, Happily or September - taking on colts in the Lagadere. He doesn't normally do that. Might such an approach indicate he's more interested in that record than he lets on!
As for the Arc itself it looks pretty straightforward. If Enable brings her A-game she will probably win. But only big shots will want to play odds-on about it. If there's cut in the ground, Order Of St George may be an each way alternative. If there isn't then maybe Capri. But an Enable victory will unquestionably make her 2017's European champion.
