Great British Racing's National Racehorse Week, which takes place from September 7-15, will see 130 venues across England, Scotland, and Wales open their doors over the course of the event as it returns for the fourth consecutive year. Ninety-one yards have signed up to participate in 2024, including those of Nicky Henderson, Charlie and Mark Johnston, David Pipe and Kim Bailey.
“I'm a great believer that racing yards should open their doors to the public and National Racehorse Week provides us with a golden opportunity to push the curtains aside and let people see what lies behind,” said Bailey. “It's been a huge success for racing and gets bigger and better every year. Our open day has grown from 40 people visiting in our first year to over 300 people last September.”
Yards taking part provide small and intimate 25-person events through to huge open days for between 500-800 people, hosted by trainers including Rebecca Menzies, Olly Murphy and Oliver Greenall and Josh Guerriero.
In addition to training yards, nine studs and ten retraining centres will welcome visitors, helping to showcase the full life of horses bred for racing. New participants for 2024 include Shadwell and the National Stud, plus Godolphin's Lifetime Care rehoming centre.
As in other years, National Racehorse Week will be bookended by the ARC Malton Open Day on Sunday, September 8 and the Henry Cecil Open Weekend in Newmarket on September 21-22, bringing the total number of locations on offer to the public during that period to 132.
These events are ticketed with funds donated to Racing Welfare (Malton and Newmarket events) and the Newmarket Housing Trust (Newmarket events).
Bookings for National Racehorse Week are now open via nationalracehorseweek.uk.
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