Leopardstown officials expect big numbers through the gates for their upcoming four-day Christmas festival and have insisted that professionals such as trainers and jockeys working at race meetings are a “very small percentage” of any overall attendance figures.
An official crowd total of 62,748 was recorded for Leopardstown’s four days over Christmas last year. That was an increase of 700 on 2023 and up 2,270 on the 2022 tally of 60,478. Crowds of around 20,000 are expected for Limerick’s four-day festival. There is also St Stephens Day racing at Down Royal.
It is one of the busiest times of the racing year in terms of public engagement. Despite this, the precise nature of attendance levels appears blurry after it emerged last month that everyone at a race meeting in Ireland gets counted in the overall figures returned by individual tracks.
The boss of Navan, one of four racecourses operated by Horse Racing Ireland (HRI), the semi-state body in charge of racing, confirmed what has long been suspected – that even those in a working capacity at a meeting get counted as attendees.
READ MORE
Explaining why Navan’s Winter Festival attendance levels were slightly down, the track’s general manager Ciaran Flynn said paying-customer levels were up. He confirmed that the dip was due to a drop in the numbers of industry personnel there.
Flynn explained it is standard practice at all four HRI-run tracks – also including Leopardstown, Fairyhouse and Tipperary – to count paying customers, owners and working personnel in overall crowd figures. It is also believed to be standard practice at all of Ireland’s 26 racecourses.
On Monday, Paul Dermody, CEO of HRI Racecourses, said when it comes to those who access tracks through Association of Irish Racecourses entry cards, the numbers involved are very small in an overall context.
“There are certain weeks of the year that it feels like everyone is racing,” he said. “Leopardstown at Christmas, Punchestown, Galway . . . [on] those weeks, it feels like the entire country is tuned into National Hunt racing. It’s going to be live on TV.
“The attendances [at Leopardstown] are going to be on a par with the 62,000-plus we had here last year. The people who are here are going to be tuned into the racing. The people that are coming through the gates are counted. People who are coming as owners or syndicates are counted and that’s pretty standard across the board.
“Someone coming through the AIR gate who is attending here may be coming as a fan as well. They may be here in a working capacity. It’s a very small number in the context of the big crowds we’re getting here at Christmas. I wouldn’t like to focus on a very small percentage of the number that are coming here racing."
HRI statistics for the year 2024 showed official overall attendance of 1.242 million at Irish racecourses. That was up 0.5 per cent on 2023.
With Leopardstown’s new CEO Mark Clayton not starting at the south Dublin track until the New Year, Dermody is at the helm of HRI’s team over Christmas.
The organisation’s Head of Racing, Peter Roe, said on Monday that watering Leopardstown’s steeplechase track may not be necessary for the upcoming festival.
Regular watering of the chase course has been necessary in recent years to keep conditions suitable for National Hunt horses. At the 2021 Christmas festival, a couple of inches of rain fell in a Christmas Day downpour, yet watering still had to take place on day two of the meeting.
“We haven’t watered since September. The chase track hasn’t been touched. Touch wood, for the first time in a number of years, it hasn’t had to be. The man above has saved us,” Roe joked in reference to recent heavy rainfall.
As for the possibility of watering, he said: “I’d certainly not say never. But it’s unlikely. But if we need to water, we will, with the aim of producing yielding ground.”
Part of Roe’s duties now involve being acting manager at Thurles. It is part of an agreement between HRI and the Molony family – who own the course and had announced its closure in July – to keep racing there this season.
Quick ground conditions at Thurles and provision for a modern watering system had been problematic. But after five meetings so far this autumn and winter, Roe has reported satisfaction with progress ahead of Saturday’s final fixture before Christmas.
“Thurles and Leopardstown have to be two of the driest tracks in the country," he said. “I was in Fairyhouse and it was soft to heavy. Navan was similar. But these two are two of the driest.
“We are very happy where we are at Thurles. It has taken the rain very well. We’ve had very positive local support and from trainers."
Colonel Mustard and Honesty Policy are two Irish-trained entries still in the mix for Saturday’s Grade One Howden Long Walk Hurdle over three miles at Ascot. Impose Toi is also among the 13 left in the race, as is Crambo, who is on course to try and win it for a third year in a row.
