Gordon Elliott and Luke Dempsey celebrate the Galway Plate win of Borice© Photo Healy Racing
The 2019 Galway Festival drew to a close at Ballybit this afternoon with general attendance over the seven days nearly on a par with 12 months ago.
The total attendance over the week for the 150th anniversary of the Galway Races was 129,118 which was down 3,573 on last year’s figure of 132,691.
Betting with the bookmakers showed a year on year increase for the first time in over a decade with a total of €6,801,009 bet in the ring.
This shows an increase of €460,479 on turnover from 12 months ago.
However the Tote was down sharply with the total Tote aggregate over the week €4,230,422 which was over a million euro less than €5,298,536 in 2018.
Willie Mullins was the leading trainer for the fourth successive year with a total of ten winners, while Paul Townend (six wins) was the top National Hunt jockey and Donnacha O’Brien took the Flat award with eight winners.
