Irish racing

The Irish Flat season has been extended an extra week and will end at Naas on Nov. 7, as an updated Irish fixture list was released by Horse Racing Ireland on Thursday. The revised schedule covers August through December and sees an additional 39 race meetings added in the final five months of the year restoring 48 of the 87 fixtures that were lost between the end of March and Irish racing's June 8th resumption. HRI's Director of Racing Jason Morris said, "We have worked closely with all racecourses to...

Rewards4Racing, the industry's rewards programme, will be offering its services and expertise to all UK and Irish racecourses, the organisation announced on Wednesday. In 2019, 960,000 tickets were purchased by the reward programme's members, and data has show that they attend race meetings more frequently and spend more when they come racing. One of the tracks that has accepted the offer is Plumpton Racecourse. Racing begins again in the UK on June 1, while Irish racing kicks off on June 8 after extended coronavirus-induced breaks. "During these unprecedented times, there...

A series of new one-hour evening programmes on Irish racing on consecutive Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays in June and early July on RTE television have been confirmed by Horse Racing Ireland and RTE on Tuesday. These new programmes, to be broadcasted on RTE2 and RTE Player with 10 extra meetings confirmed up to mid-July, will be held from 7-8 p.m. on Fridays and from 5-6 p.m. on Saturdays/Sundays. Hugh Cahill will be the main presenter, with guest analysts joining regulars Jane Mangan, Ted Walsh and Ruby Walsh. All of RTE...

Ireland's lockdown, originally set to expire on Sunday, has been extended three weeks to May 5, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar announced on Friday. The nation went into lockdown on Mar. 24, the day after Naas's opening meeting of the flat season, including the cancellation of all sporting events. Racing, therefore, is on the shelf in Ireland for another three weeks minimum. Earlier this week, Emma Berry spoke with Horse Racing Ireland Chief Executive Officer and European Pattern Committee Chairman Brian Kavanagh about plans for the European pattern calendar. Click here to...

All sporting events in Ireland have been suspended following an announcement from the Irish Government. Racing has been continuing to stage meetings behind closed doors since Mar. 13, as countries around the world try to limit the spread of the coronavirus. However, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar announced on Tuesday that all sporting events, even those without spectators, would be cancelled. Racing in Britain was suspended from last Wednesday, with no action anticipated before May 1 at the earliest. Racing had been due to take place at Dundalk on Wednesday. The Board...

The 2019 Irish horse racing and breeding industry statistics were released by Horse Racing Ireland on Monday. During the past year, the number of horses returned in training in Ireland rose 3% to 8,949, with new owner registrations up by 6.8% to 851 new racehorse owners. These were split into 600 new sole owners and partners and 216 new syndicates. Commercial race sponsorship and contributions to prizemoney by racecourses continued to rise also, growing by 17.3% in 2019. There were over 1.3 million people who attended a racemeeting in 2019...