Horse Racing Ireland Announces Half Year Figures Attendances at Irish race meetings grew by 1,743 in the first six months of 2008. This puts horse racing on target to achieve a new record figure of 1.5 million racegoers by the end of the year. For the first time, these figures incorporate attendance data for the two racecourses in the North (figures included for both years). However, it should be noted that this increase was achieved from a higher number of fixtures and the average attendance per meeting declined from 4,116 to 3,767 (-8.5%). Punchestown´s National Hunt Festival in April was the star performer in terms of increased racecourse attendances, growing its overall attendance from 90,868 at the four-day meeting in 2007 to 105,669 over the five days in 2008, with a remarkable figure of 19,512 attracted to the Saturday for its first year of inclusion within the Festival. The half-year figures, which were released by Horse Racing Ireland (HRI) today, also show continuing growth in many of the key performance indicators measured by the industry. The number of fixtures (+9.6%), races (+8.6%), total runners (+8.3%) and individual runners (+6.4%) have all increased year-on-year, as have the number of horses in training returned so far in 2008 (+3.3%). Despite a small drop in race sponsorship, prize money still grew overall by 6.6% to 27m. One area where the economic downturn has been more evident is in relation to betting turnover. The Tote has seen a modest decline of just 1% in total turnover, but on-course bookmakers have fared worse, recording a near 14% drop in their turnover compared to last year. A very welcome decrease relates to the number of horses that have been balloted out of races. At the half year, the number of eliminations has dropped by 17.8% compared to 2007 reflecting additional quality control measures implemented by HRI this year. Commenting on the figures, Brian Kavanagh, Chief Executive, Horse Racing Ireland (HRI) said:- Against a challenging economic background, horse racing has been able to maintain its overall level of attendance in the first six months of 2008 and the Tote´s turnover is virtually on a par with last year. Although there is anecdotal evidence that trainers are starting to see a decline in horse numbers, this is not reflected in the figures for the year to date. In the month of June there were 7,320 horses in training compared to 7,176 for the same month last year. Nonetheless, HRI recognises that there is likely to be a downturn in horse numbers as the year progresses. Brian Kavanagh continued: One of the most pleasing aspects of the year has been the significant improvement in the balloting situation, which whilst still problematic, has seen an almost 18% decline in the total number of eliminations at the half year point. However, further progress is still required and HRI has therefore taken the decision to extend its quality control efforts by increasing the minimum qualifying rating under both codes for 2009 from 45 to 47 for the flat and from 77 to 80 for hurdle races. Looking to the future, Brian Kavanagh noted that a number of major projects are due to be considered for grant aid by HRI, including the development of an entirely new, re-located racecourse in Tramore (where work on the racetrack itself is already well advanced), the planned 100m redevelopment of the Curragh, a new weigh room in Roscommon and improvements to both the car parks and general facilities at Limerick.
