Racing in Australia is booming

Racing Victoria has announced that turnover on Victorian racing increased 32.6 per cent to a record $5.07 billion in the first half of the 2020/21 season, reports Racing.com.

Revealing the first-half results for the racing season, which came during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, RV also announced turnover per meeting increased significantly to $19.42 million – up from $14.7m in the corresponding period 12 months earlier.

Strong results were also seen in country racing, with a 36.3 per cent increase in turnover and above-average growth was recorded at country meetings on Tuesdays, Thursday nights, Friday nights and Saturdays.

RV boss Giles Thompson said the record turnover is a ‘really great outcome’, but admitted the challenge is to sustain that growth.

“We’d have to be fools if we think it’s totally sustainable,” Thompson said.

“We have no doubt attracted new people and we have re-energised people in racing. Our challenge is to see how much we can hold onto now that we have experienced that.

“We are now cycling through high-growth periods of last year, so it is much flatter at the moment. It will be interesting to see how much we can retain.

“I hope that we don’t go back to the pre-COVID levels, but I am realistic that people engaged with us while there was very little else on and limited competition.”

The impacts of COVID-19 restrictions were felt on the retail betting front, with its share of wagering during the Spring Carnival dropping from 24 per cent in 2019 to 12 per cent in 2020.

Digital turnover accounted for 86.5 per cent of all turnover in H1 2020/21 – up from 74.9 per cent in the first half last season.

“Those who believe retail is dead is calling that way too soon. I think retail has a really good future,” Thompson said.

“I think it’s really important we support Tabcorp as they continue to explore what they call digital in retail. You bring the retail environment alive with the digital experience.”

Meanwhile, average-field sizes across all TAB meetings increased slightly to 10 in H1, up from 9.8 in H1 19/20.

Each-way betting also increased, with the number of races with fewer than eight starters decreasing from 338 to 295.

Female jockeys also enjoyed greater opportunities with average rides for the half increasing from 56.5 to 93.6, a boost of 65.7 per cent.

That led to a 32.5 per cent increase in wins by female jockeys during the period.