Horse Racing Ireland will implement measures designed to improve field sizes–extended declaration deadlines for races with small fields, increased prize money for placed horses and paying out to the top-five finishers in all races–beginning Feb. 1.
“HRI are introducing these measures with the aim of attracting more runners in races which might have historically struggled with small fields and also in attempt to increase the percentage of horses which win prize-money,” said HRI's Director of Racing Jason Morris.
For a three-month trial period beginning Feb. 1 all weight-for-age races with fewer than five declared runners at the 10 a.m. declaration time will have an automatic 15 minute supplementary period where additional declarations may be made.
Beginning Feb. 1 for National Hunt racing and Mar. 20 for flat racing, second-placed horses will receive 20% of the purse; third will get 10%, fourth 5% and fifth 2.5%. The current breakdown for those places is 17%, 8% and 5%, with no payout for fifth in some races. Payout will extend to sixth in all races worth €40,000 or more.
“The 15-minute extension to the declaration deadline for weight-for-age races which have attracted less than five initial declarations will be trialled for a three-month period to see whether it has a beneficial impact upon field sizes,” said Morris. “This change should not have any material impact upon the timing of the release of declarations information. An increase to five or more runners in a race has a very positive impact on betting turnover since it allows for each-way betting. HRI are always striving to improve the competitiveness of Irish racing, notwithstanding the fact that our average field sizes [at 10.73 in 2015] are approximately two runners per race higher than in Britain.”
“We intend to conduct a similar trial in relation to an extension in the entry deadline [for races with smaller initial entries] later in the year,” Morris added.
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