When will horse racing return?

Irish horse racing stopped on March 24th following the Government’s instruction in the fight against Covid19 that all sporting events were to cease from the following day.

This was one week later than the stoppages came into effect in France and Britain which both stopped on March 17th so as we are about to enter our second month without horse racing in this part of the world the big question is when is it likely to resume?

Racing is still taking place behind closed doors in a number of countries including parts of America, Japan, Australia and Hong Kong. There are varying reasons why the sport is continuing in each of those jurisdictions but the biggest difference is that the horses are stabled at the racecourses so there is less movement of people and animals compared to the European model.

While virtually every country in Europe remains in lockdown there are some green shoots beginning to appear as several Governments are looking to ease their restrictions in the coming days.

Swedish and Norwegian Trotting and betting on it called Trav odds did continue into April but there has been no actual horse racing on the continent this month.

Germany is scheduled to start back racing on May 1st. The racing there will be behind closed doors until June 15th with a number of similar restrictions to those that applied in Ireland before last month’s stoppage.

It is a similar situation in Britain where the sport’s governing body announced a halt to all fixtures until at least May 1st after which point racing would be behind closed doors for a minimum period of one month.

France had also expected to resume racing at the beginning of May but their lockdown has since been extended from April 15th to May 11th.

In Ireland the lockdown was also extended and the current date for an easing of restrictions is May 5th. It would seem likely that racing could resume in Ireland behind closed doors within days of that deadline as the sport uses private ambulance services and has its own doctors.

When racing does resume in Ireland it will remain behind closed doors for one month and will be restricted to Flat racing only.

All in all it looks most likely that racing will be back in most parts of Europe during the month of May but only behind closed doors.

The question that then remains is how sustainable is racing without crowds? It shouldn’t be a major issue for countries like France where their sport is fully funded through Pari Mutuel pool betting but we have already seen the cancellation of the York Dante meeting in the UK next month because the racecourse deems it unviable to race behind closed doors.

In Ireland and the UK racecourses receive Media Rights payments for the broadcasting of their events and while this is sufficient for smaller meetings to continue it will be difficult to sustain that for a prolonged period unless betting shops also reopen because it is they that ultimately pay the media rights.

In Germany the prize money will be cut by 50% when racing takes place behind closed doors but there have been no similar announcements for either Ireland or the UK.

Sponsorship of races is a significant source of revenue for racecourses and in turn helps fund prize money so racing behind closed doors is going to be a significant challenge for the sport.

Irish racing has a buffer in the form of the Government’s funding of the industry through its semi-state organisation Horse Racing Ireland which supplements all prize money but it would not be surprising to see some reductions here if there is a prolonged period of racing without audiences.