Five years on from an other-worldly Cheltenham festival which unfolded in the shadow of Covid-19, in front of packed stands that would soon become emblematic of the country’s hesitant stumble into lockdown, one of Britain’s most popular sporting events once again finds itself at a crossroads, after sharp declines in attendance in the last two years.
It is not a lingering hangover from the pandemic, or the result of racegoers losing the festival habit in 2021, when the meeting was staged behind closed doors. Far from it. The first post-covid festival with full attendance in 2022 attracted record crowds throughout the week to post a new high for the four days of nearly 281,000 racegoers.
But for a significant number of those spectators, there was something about the festival in 2022 that persuaded them not to repeat the experience. While next Friday’s card, with the Cheltenham Gold Cup, steeplechasing’s championship event, as the centrepiece, has maintained its sell-out status, attendance for the first three days of the meeting, from Tuesday to Thursday, has dropped 22% in two years since the 2022 peak. Over the four days as a whole, the crowds are down by 18%.
The cost-of-living crisis, which started to bite from mid-2022, has no doubt played a part. Tickets for the Club enclosure, with the best views of the finish, cost £100 on the first three days and £118 on Gold Cup day. Add in the cost of parking, or a train to Cheltenham Spa station, which is a bus or £15 taxi ride away from the track itself, and plenty of racegoers will have shelled out the best part of £200 before placing a single bet or fighting their way to the bar for a £7.80 pint of Guinness.
Increasing numbers of racing fans have also been finding alternative ways to get their festival fix. A combination of guaranteed sunshine, cheap beer and dozens of bars showing the action on big screens means that Cheltenham week is fast becoming one of the busiest of the year in Benidorm.
So while an appetite clearly remains for the most competitive and dramatic four days of racing in the calendar, it does not necessarily include being there to see it first-hand.
Given the huge importance of the festival to the racecourse, the local area and the racing industry as a whole, however, it is not a decline that can be allowed to continue. The most recent estimate of the festival’s economic impact on Cheltenham and the surrounding area was £270m. In a sport that stages 10,000 races annually, meanwhile, the 28 races at the festival are certain to be in the top 50 – or 0.5% – for betting turnover over the course of 2025.
The job of reversing the current momentum at Cheltenham falls to Guy Lavender, who arrived at the course as its chief executive in January having spent seven years in the same role at Marylebone Cricket Club. He brings a brisk, can-do enthusiasm to the task at hand which reflects not only a lifelong passion for jump racing, but also an 18-year stint in the Parachute regiment before his move to Lord’s.
Lavender is confident that racegoers at Cheltenham next week will have a much-improved experience, after a series of changes to both the racing programme and facilities.
Ugly scenes 12 months ago when persistent rain turned the car parks – charging £30 per vehicle – into a mudbath should now be a thing of the past, while the track has also taken the bold step of significantly expanding the areas where punters can drink alcohol while watching the racing. Changes to several races should also boost field sizes and make the contests more competitive and compelling, reducing the number of races with short-priced favourites.
“I think there’s no doubt that it was a difficult festival last year, that’s been readily acknowledged,” Lavender said this week. “[But] if you look at the changes that have been implemented since last year, there’s some quite significant ones.
“The racing programme is moving in the right direction of creating more competitive racing and bringing the best horses up against each other. Car parking was an issue last year and this year we’ll effectively park 7,000 cars on hard standing, and I think the relaxation of alcohol movement policies, to enable people to have a beer and watch the racing, will be really transformational for different parts of the crowd.”
Beer on the lawns and within sight of the running rail may also infuriate more traditional racegoers, who simply want to focus on the horses. But a Cheltenham festival crowd is a demographic hotchpotch of young and old, townies and country folk, drinkers and gamblers, and also fans who see the horses and jockeys, racing and jumping at speed in one of the finest natural amphitheatres in all of sport, as the only drug they need.
Carlisle 2.00 Smart Decision 2.30 Smokeringinthedark 3.00 Master Breffni 3.30 Tyson Magoo 4.00 Hello Judge 4.35 Milajess 5.10 Saint Calvados
Warwick 2.20 Ostrava Du Berlais 2.50 King Ulanda (nap) 3.20 St Pancras 3.50 Gentleman Jacques 4.23 Sole Solution 4.58 Illico De Cotte (nb) 5.30 Destination Dubai
“The festival is the Olympics of National Hunt racing and it comes with a huge element of responsibility which we have to get right,” Lavender says. “We know what the barriers are to attendance and our strategy is to attack all of those things.
“If numbers are slightly down, it allows you to deliver a better experience, so the measure of success this year is delivering brilliant experiences for people who come to the festival. If you get that bit right, people’s enthusiasm and love for the festival will grow over time.”
Having overseen Ashes Tests and Cricket World Cup finals during his time at Lord’s, Lavender is now responsible for another great British sporting institution. But he can also draw on his army experience to put the pressure of the task at hand into context. “It doesn’t feel quite as terrifying,” he says, “as the first time you jump out of a plane.”
