Groundhog Day: low attendance & poor racegoer experience – the Curragh is in the news for all the wrong reasons yet again.
Irish flat racing HQ staged the 3-day “Irish Guineas Festival” last weekend. A superb package of top-class racing, that included the first Classic races of the new season, as well as an additional five Group races.
Tickets were comparably cheap (€20 early bid), especially compared to other top-class sporting events (or admission to many UK racecourses). And yet, very few turned up to watch Lake Victoria romping home in the 1000 Guineas on Sunday, or a day earlier Field Of Gold getting his stylish redemption in the Irish 2000 Guineas.
No doubt, the shocking weather didn’t help to entice punters to go racing and brave the elements – a tragedy, because the racing was superb. But who can blame those who stayed home: the Curragh isn’t a great place to be at when the weather doesn’t play its part. That’s one of the disappointing facts about this shiny new facility that cost upward of €70 million to redevelop.
However, even in previous years, when the weather gods provided somewhat kinder conditions, attendance figures on Guineas weekend (3 days) didn’t make for pretty reading: 14.088 (2024), 14.773 (2023) and 12.700 (2022). Neither 2000 Guineas Saturday- or 1000 Guineas Sunday broke the 6.000 mark during this period.
This isn’t a once-off phenomenon – it’s a new normal for racing at the Curragh. Attendance for the Derby is anywhere between 10-13k these days, a dramatic decline from 2015, the final Derby run at the Curragh before the redevelopment, that saw a whopping 25.225 huddling around the parade ring to get a glimpse of Jack Hobbs.
Surely, nobody wants to try and rewrite history in an attempt to romanticise the old Curragh. It was a kip when it got finally demolished; walls could tell stories of yesteryear, electric cables dangling dangerously loose in the wind above the heads of racegoers, and the cramming inside the betting hall around the small TVs put those with claustrophobia in a state of paralysis.
Nonetheless, I used to be a member at the old Curragh and I loved the old, shabby place. The available space was rather well utilised to the most part, there was a logic flow through the track for the racegoer and even though the parade ring was a lot smaller than the new one, you still saw the horses!
Perhaps I am romanticising the old Curragh?!
The annual membership was affordable and provided dedicated parking, quick access to the track, a charming members bar overlooking the finish line, a designated members area to watch the racing with the best view across the track, and the occasional side offerings like trips to Coolmore Stud.
Back then the membership was about €180 and seriously good value, even if you couldn’t go every time they raced. In 2025 the membership fee stands at a whopping €350 (mind, when they reponed it was ‘only’ €265…. call that inflation?!).
Granted, that’s still not bad value if you go to all the 24 days. But who does that? Very few. It’s a steep price. In the past it was decent value even if you only went 10-12 times a year, plus the added perks made it worthwhile. Not so much these days.
Anecdotally (I would love to see official figures) the Curragh lost members during the rebuild (when they offered temporary facilities but charged full price, nonetheless) and certainly in subsequent years, due to the significant price hike.
The sad reality is, members or not, ever since the reopening of the redeveloped Curragh, people have voted with their feet and stayed largely away. The drop in attendance for marquee race days, as highlighted earlier, is nothing less than dramatic.
That’s strange, because logic would dictate that a new, modern facility would encourage more and not less people to attend fixtures.
While the official attendance figures for last weekend haven’t been released yet, it’s hard to believe they’ll be any better than the aforementioned figures in 2023 or 2024.
I was there and it didn’t feel a busy on Saturday. It’s certainly eye-opening when AK Bets outlines in their excellent The Racing Room Podcast that they took merely 95 and 55 on the two Classic days. On the lesser days, the place is basically deserted.
The question is: why? Why do people vote with their feet? It can’t be the price point: admission is incredibly affordable, even for the best days of racing at the Curragh – I want to highlight that as a clear positive (while I remain critical of the pricing for the membership) – the early bird offerings are superb value for money. €20 for the 2000 Guineas, €25 for the Irish Derby, for example.
The place hasn’t moved. It’s where its always been. Getting to it is possibly by public transport via bus or train and subsequent shuttle busses, albeit not as plain a sailing as it could be – I did that many years while living in Dublin. Car parking is free onsite. Food and drink, while not cheap, is competitively priced in comparison to rugby, football or GAA.
Why then the dramatic drop-off in attendance? From my personal experience the often cited pain points with the new Curragh mirror the ones I see as well:
- Poor design and use of the space available – some key areas feel overcrowded even if overall attendance is low.
- Parade ring isn’t a great place for viewing the horses ((despite having been redone!).
- Main hall inside the stand gives the vibe of a train station or airport arrival hall.
- Not enough seating available inside.
- The roof’s still whistling furiously in windy conditions.
- Poor protection from the elements in the grandstand.
Some of these criticisms are possibly harsh and contradictory. Racing is an outdoor sport, you can expect to get wet if you want see the horses in the parade ring.
On the other hand, where money’s spend (especially tax-payers money) an expectation of excellence follows. And this expectation of excellence isn’t met at the new Curragh. Be it the roof, be it the facilities inside, be it the poorly designed parade ring.
It’s also hard to imagine that the place could pack more than 15.000. It would be total carnage, with multiple bottlenecks and poor crowd flow. Even with only 10.000 onsite, these issues persist when previously at the old site 20.000 could fit relatively comfortably.
I want to be fair and balanced, and give credit to recent attempts to improve the experience. New marquee tents, food vans, a SPAR inside, more tables and seats. Admission has been made more affordable. So, something is done. Yet, it’s not enough to make you want to spend half a day there. It remains a cold, windy and rather uncomfortable place. Smaller, older tracks around the country do it much better.
Perhaps, for plenty of people the habit of going racing at the Curragh got broken during the redevelopment phase as well. Some never got back into the habit. Some returned once or twice and didn’t enjoy the experience. They’ve never been back.
There’s also a considerable lack of visibility inside the Kildare community. I live in Naas. It’s a 15min drive down the M7 for me. I can’t recall having seen any marketing for the Guineas Festival. Unless you’re a racing fan, you probably wouldn’t have known there’s two of the most important races in the Irish flat racing calendar taking place over the weekend.
Personally, I can’t offer many solutions. Saying that, it’s not my job. I only speak as a racing fan and from my personal experience. And that experience hasn’t been great.
I feel the bird has flown, and the glory days will never return. Flat racing has never been that popular in Ireland. Nonetheless, there shouldn’t be an obvious reason why attendances at the Curragh have dropped so dramatically since the redevelopment, when plenty other sports are thriving in the post-covid era.
There shouldn’t be one obvious reason. Yet there are multiple obvious reasons for the decline. And they are self-inflicted. The blame lies firmly with the racecourse management. It seems, as populist as this may sound: the track has been build for those in the posh seats, with us peasants (aka the average racegoer) forgotten.
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