Bookies© Photo Healy Racing
The On-course bookmakers have struggled to adapt to a rapidly changing environment and all indications suggest their days are numbered.
The recently held Galway Races have long been seen as a barometer to the state of the industry but the figures from the betting ring mask the terminal decline of a once robust betting ring.
Few will shed a tear for their demise - in fact many see them as of little benefit to the sport – only out for themselves and with scant regard for the industry as a whole.
That said, Bookmakers play a vital role in the overall industry and not just by adding colour to a day at the races. They are in fact racing’s ‘front of house’.
Racegoers have no contact with either the administrators or participants of the sport. The average racegoer has no idea who HRI or the Turf Club are and has little chance of ever meeting the likes of Aidan O’Brien or Ruby Walsh. Instead it is the on-course bookmakers that are in constant contact with the racing public.
Like any group of people some bookmakers are better than others at interacting with the public but overall they do a pretty good job and are generally outgoing and courteous.
A race meeting without bookies would be a far poorer experience but how can it be avoided? Already stay-at-home punters get a far better deal than those who make the effort to turn up at the track.
Going racing is far more expensive than not. Travel costs, admission, racecard, high priced food and drink and less favourable betting terms than are available from the high street alternative. Stay at home and you get to see all the races live via Attheraces and are often better informed than those at the track.
The biggest threat to the on-course layers is the emergence of mobile betting. Smart phones are fast becoming the ultimate tool in the armoury of the major bookmaking firms. Paddy Power reported a 74% increase in mobile betting in 2013 and William Hill experienced a similar increase in the first 6 months of this year alone.
Now the punters who turn up at the races are as likely to place a bet via their mobile phone as they are in the traditional way.
Even King Canute would struggle to keep this particular tide at bay. Unless there can be some positive discrimination in favour of the on-course bookies via betting tax incentives for punters it seems inevitable that all but the major fixtures will struggle to attract more than a handful of bookies if any at all.
While on the subject of betting has anyone else noticed the regularity with which the Tote declare 1.02 place dividends. In reality only a handful of horses during a year merit a 1/50 price tag to be placed yet rarely does an Irish race meeting pass without at least one such dividend being declared. [3 in Tipperary on Friday including a 7/1 shot in a handicap, 1 at Kilbeggan on Saturday and 2 more at the Curragh Sunday]
The positive PR the Tote receives from their large Pick 6 Rollovers is eroded every time a 1.02 dividend is returned. Surely it wouldn’t cost much to re-instate the traditional 1.10 minimum return.
The Curragh racecourse has long been in need of refurbishment and the point was embarrassingly highlighted during Sunday’s Group 1 Pheonix Stakes fixture when the roof of the main Tote hall leaked.
The sight of three buckets to catch the water is not what you expect on the eve of the launch of the inaugural Champions Weekend. Fingers crossed it doesn’t rain on 14th September.
Brian O'Connor's blog will return next Monday.
