This week’s weather outlook is not classically festive, but it looks like delivering bumper Christmas festival attendances to Leopardstown.
A year ago, just over 62,000 people poured through the gates at one of Irish racing’s most important festival dates. That was up from 2022′s tally of 60,478 and occurred despite notably unpleasant conditions in the middle of the four days.
This time there’s an unseasonably mild and dry outlook that mightn’t be Christmas card material but could add to numbers prepared to invest in a racecard.
“Things are certainly tracking well. You never know, because the way the days fall, some people may be going back to work. But the numbers are tacking very well compared to last year,” Leopardstown’s chief executive, Tim Husbands, said on Sunday.
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“It looks we could get a dry four days which would be brilliant. Last year it was absolutely lashing it down for the middle two days. So, it is very much a factor. If it looks like a nice enjoyable, comfortable day out, I think they’re much more likely to get in their cars and come.
“Those that come will see a lot of improvements. There will be much bigger marquees. There are more toilets, more food trucks; we’re trying to create much more of a festival atmosphere.”
Final declarations for the three St Stephens Day’s fixtures in Ireland, and Friday’s action at Leopardstown and Limerick, will take place on Monday.
The new St Stephen’s Day Grade One feature at Leopardstown is the €100,000 Racing Post Long Distance Chase, a three-mile contest moved from its old final day festival slot to fill in for the demoted two-mile novice contest that traditionally featured.
Ground conditions at the Foxrock track are currently “yielding” with some watering continuing to maintain that. The state of Leopardstown’s steeplechase course had come under scrutiny some years ago but extensive watering has taken place in recent months.
“I walked the track last week with Willie Mullins and Frank Berry and they were very comfortable with it. They said it’s great, nice and yielding, and they’re very pleased with the work we’ve done over the last four months to make sure we are where we are.
“Everyone says how much rain are you going to get; we work on the basis that we’re not going to get any so anything else is a bonus,” Husbands said.
The Savills Chase was last year’s day three centrepiece and featured a swaggering display by Galopin Des Champs in front of a weather-hit attendance of 15,778.
The prospect of the dual-Gold Cup hero taking on his stable companion Fact To File in the race this week promises to be a festival highlight, and in front of a potentially much bigger crowd on Saturday.
“Fact To File and Galopin Des Champs are both well and fine, and both are on course to run in the Savills,” said Mullins.
Although Leopardstown recently announced next February’s Dublin Racing Festival (DRF) will be pre-booked, tickets will be sold at the gates for this week’s Christmas action. An estimated 1,000 admission tickets were sold per day at the gates in 2023.
“The biggest days last year were 17,500 to 18,000. It’s only when we got to the DRF and we got 20,000 on the first day we felt that was a little bit too many, hence that’s why we’ve gone all-ticket. We’re reducing the capacity by about 1,500 just to make sure, from the feedback we got, that the optimum customer experience is there.” Husbands commented.
Some of the most high-profile horses in the sport will be in action over Christmas, although not all in Ireland.
Mullins’s star mare Lossiemouth is set for a memorable clash with Constitution Hill in Thursday’s Christmas Hurdle at Kempton while Spillane’s Tower tops a strong Irish team in contention for the King George VI Chase later that day.
Mullins also looks like sending the hugely exciting novice Ballyburn to Kempton on Friday rather than staying at home for the following day’s Grade One Guinness Faugheen Novice Chase at Limerick. He has been left in the Wayward Lad Chase and a potential clash with Sir Gino.
“Ballyburn is in both Kempton and Limerick, but it looks like Kempton for him. Hopefully there’ll be nice ground there, it suits timewise, and we might have three horses – Impairs Et Passe, Mirazur West and Sa Majeste – for the Limerick race,” he said.
Friday’s cross-channel feature will be Chepstow’s Welsh Grand National, a race won just twice before by Irish-trained horses. They were Notre Pere (2008) and Rax De Maree in 2017.
The latter’s trainer Gavin Cromwell has Evies Vladimir as a contender this time while Gordon Elliott could run both Where It All Began and the Troytown winner Stuzzikini.
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