Daily attendance at the upcoming Dublin Racing Festival is capped at 18,500 with all tickets required to be pre-booked.
Leopardstown’s authorities have opted to not sell tickets at the gate, a gamble that isn’t expected to impact on overall crowd levels during the hugely significant weekend action over February 1st-2nd.
The move has been made on the back of last year’s festival when a record Saturday attendance of just over 20,000 was returned. It contributed to an overall crowd figure of 36,020, up four per cent on the previous year.
However, there were complaints about how Leopardstown’s facilities were under pressure due to the size of the Day 1 crowd. There were also concerns expressed about traffic management en route to the Foxrock track.
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“I think we can make it more comfortable and looking at what happened over Christmas we saw we’ve gone in the right direction. There were 17,000 on each of the first three days and the bars and the food offerings and the toilet facilities, all the modernisations we’ve done, led to a much more comfortable experience,” Leopardstown’s chief executive Tim Husbands said.
This time the Saturday programme, featuring the €250,000 Paddy Power Irish Gold Cup, has competition for public appeal as the Ireland-England rugby international takes place at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin on the same day. The game’s 4.45 kick-off is just minutes after the final race will be run at Leopardstown. A similar clash in 2019 saw a slight reduction in crowd size.
“It seems to be that particular fixture and we do have a challenge with the rugby taking place. We’re obviously looking to use it as an opportunity by saying if you’re coming to see live sport you can still cover a few races and then go on to the match; or you can go to the match, stay on over and come here on Sunday,” Husbands commented.
Leopardstown’s boss said 70 per cent of ticket sales for such an event come in the final three weeks. Cross-channel visitors made up 38 per cent of last year’s attendance.
On the track, last year’s seventh DRF was dominated by Willie Mullins as the champion trainer saddled nine of the 15 winners. They included an unprecedented clean sweep of all eight Grade One prizes up for grabs.
Having crashed through the century of Grade One winners mark at the Cheltenham Festival last year, Mullins now looks all but certain to break 50 winners at the DRF. The sport’s dominant figure is on 47 for the Leopardstown meeting. A remarkable 34 of those have been Grade Ones.
This time he has 47 of the 118 initial entries made for next month’s top-flight races. His great rival Gordon Elliott has 32 and a potential head-to-head between the pair could highlight the €200,000 Irish Champion Hurdle on day two of the festival.
Despite losing to Constitution Hill at Kempton over Christmas, Mullins’s star mare Lossiemouth currently edges favouritism for the Leopardstown contest. She is a general 11-8 shot ahead of Elliott’s Brighterdaysahead (6-4) who produced a 30-length romp over the track at Christmas.
Ireland’s pecking order for Cheltenham’s Queen Mother Champion Chase could be clearer after the Dublin Chase at Leopardstown, where Marine Nationale is likely to again take on Gaelic Warrior.
The pair filled the frame behind surprise winner Solness over Christmas and Barry Connell is confident that Marine Nationale has stepped up for that effort. The 2023 festival winner was making just his fourth start over fences at Christmas.
“He’s super and is all set for the Dublin Racing Festival. He’s come forward again from his last run,” said Connell. “We were delighted with the way he jumped the last day. He’s still a work in progress over fences but his jumping was excellent, and fitness and experience wise he’s coming forward.
“We’ll be quietly confident going to Leopardstown. He’s coming back to himself. People tend to forget a horse who hasn’t appeared for a while. They go off the radar. All his ability is still there and all we had to do was to get some more jumping experience into him,” added the owner/trainer.
Marine Nationale is a 7-1 in ante-post lists for his DRF target, although Gaelic Warrior is a general evens favourite.
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