In short, the country that has the most racecourses is Australia. The ‘Land Down Under’ is home to the better part of 400 racecourses, spread throughout all six states and two territories. Australian racecourses are variously classified as ‘metropolitan’, ‘provincial’ and ‘country’, according to their location and the quality of the racing staged. Famous metropolitan racecourses include Flemington, in Melbourne, Victoria, which is the venue for ‘the race that stops a nation’, the Melbourne Cup, Caulfield, also in Melbourne, Royal Randwick and Rosehill, in the eastern and western suburbs of Sydney, New South Wales and Morphettville in Adelaide, South Australia. Australian’s love a gamble, whether on real money online casino jokacasino or at the races.

Elsewhere, the United States of America, which is 127% bigger than Australia, by area, but 1,291% more populous, according to Worldata.info, is home to over 300 racecourses. The three most famous are probably Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky, Pimlico in Maryland, Baltimore and Belmont Park in Elmont, New York, which respectively stage the three ‘Triple Crown’ races, the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes and Belmont Stakes.

In Europe, thoroughbred horse racing in France takes place on 140 different racecourses. Most of the important races concentrated on those in, and around, Paris, namely Longchamp, home of the most valuable race in Europe, the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, in the Bois de Boulogne, nearby Saint-Cloud and Chantilly, in Oise, 30 miles or north of the city centre. That said, Hippodrome Deauville-La Touques, on the coast of Normandy, in northern France, hosts half a dozen Group 1 races each year and is the only racecourse outside the capital to stage races at the highest level.

Closer to home, in the British Isles, there are 59 racecourses on the British mainland – 51 in England, five in Scotland and three in Wales – two in Northern Ireland and 25 in the Republic of Ireland. In fact, the Republic of Ireland has one racecourse for every 200,000 inhabitants, approximately, which is the highest number per capita of any country.

According to the ‘Racing Calendar’ or, more correctly, its predecessor, ‘An Historical List All Horses-Matches Run’, which was first published in 1727, the history of horse racing in the vicinity of Bath dates back to 1728. Initially, meetings took place at Claverton Down, to the south-east of the city centre and approximately 20 miles from the site of the modern racecourse on Lansdown Hill, where they were staged, intermittently, until 1784. At that point, meetings were transferred to Lansdown, not to the existing site, but to one between where Beckford’s Tower, an architectural folly built in 1827, now stands and the thoroughfare knowm as Weston Lane.

Race meetings at Lansdown, though, remained irregular and ceased altogther between 1796 and 1811, with Napolean Bonparte, who came to power in 1799, attempting to wage ecomic warfare against the British Empire and, indeed, threatening to invade Britain itself, during the Napoleonic Wars. When racing resumed, it was still anything but a regular occurence, with just one, two-day meeting staged annually in May. The year 1823 saw the inauguration of the Somersetshire Stakes, which become the feature race of the day and was, at one point, a recognised trial for the Derby. Won by Tudor Minstrel – the joint-third highest-rated racehorse in the history of Timeform – in 1947, the race was eventually discontinued in 1998, but resurrected in 2011, as part of bicentennial celebrations.

In 1831, the Bath Racecourse was moved to its current location, 780 feet above sea level on the Lansdown Plateau, which gave it the distinction of being the highest Flat racing venue in the country, which it remains to this day. Indeed, of all the racecourses in the United Kingdom, only Exeter and Hexham, at heights of 850 and 800 feet above sea level, respectively, are higher than Bath.

Following the end of World War I, during which racing ceased, the Lansdown Estate changed hands, leading to speculation about the continued success of Bath Racecourse. However, erstwhile directors of the Newbury Racecourse Company, formed in 1904, had faith in the facility and banded together to buy it, at public auction, leading to the incorporation of the Bath Racecourse Company in 1919. Thus, racing at Bath continued throughout the interwar years, but during World War II the course became an airfield for the Royal Air Force (RAF), named RAF North Stoke.

In 1953, Bath Raceourse was the scene of the infamous ‘Francasal Affair’, in which a gang of fraudsters attempted to swindle bookmakers out of £60,000, or nearly £1.4 million by modern standards, based on Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation data. The plot essentially involved substituting a filly named Francasal with a useful French horse named Santa Amaro, cutting the telephone lines to the racecourse, to prevent communication between on-course and off-course bookmakers, and heavily backing the ‘ringer’ at odds of 10/1. Subsequent investigations by the General Post Office (GPO) and the police led to the arrest of five men, who were tried, twice, at the Old Bailey and four of whom were convicted and jailed for conspiracy to defraud.

Nowadays, Bath Racecourse is part of Arena Racing Company (ARC), who, as Northern Racing, acquired the property in 2000. In 2015/16 ARC funded a multi-million-pound redevelopment of the racecourse infrastructure and facilities, thereby creating a modern venue, which, nonetheless reflects the history and heritage of the site. The principal race – and, indeed, the only Pattern race of the year – at Bath is the Listed Lansdown Fillies’ Stakes, inaugurated in 1999 and run annually, over 5 furlongs and 10 yards, in April. Perhaps the most notable winner was Cassandra Go, trained by Geoff Wragg, who supplemented her victory in 2000 by winning both the Temple Stakes at Sandown Park and the King’s Stand Stakes at Royal Ascot the following season.

On July 31, Arena Racing Company (ARC) confirmed that National Hunt racing will return to Windsor Racecourse for the 2024/25 season. According to a press release, ARC has invested heavily in redeveloping the racecourse infrastructure, including widening certain areas of the track, such as the back straight, to accommodate hurdle and steeplechase races. The traditional figure-of-eight National Hunt course will also become a thing of the past, with previously ‘mothballed’ sections of turf brought up to racing standard to create a continuous, left-handed oval. The first of a small number of National Hunt fixtures anticipated for 2024/25 is scheduled for December 15, 2024, with further fixtures to follow, once the 2025 fixture list has been confirmed.

Windsor Racecourse, a.k.a. Royal Windsor Racecourse, due to the close proximity of Windsor Castle, was established on its current site, in Rays Meadow, by John Frail of Shrewsbury (who also found fame as a Conservative party agent) in 1866. National Hunt racing first took place shortly afterwards and continued on a regular basis until 1998. Thereafter, a number of fixtures were staged, temporarily, during the multimillion pound redevelopment of Ascot in 2004 and 2005. In fact, the last such fixture took place on December 16, 2005 and the final race that day was the Q Equine Ltd Handicap Hurdle, won by Acambo, trained by Martin Pipe and ridden by Timmy Murphy.

Confirmation of regularly scheduled National Hunt fixtures returning to the Berkshire track was well received by six-time champion trainer Nicky Henderson. He told the ‘Racing Post’, ‘It’s seriously good news for National Hunt racing. You’re talking to someone who is rather antiquated and can remember when jumping used to take place there. There probably aren’t many of us left!’

Synonymous with the King George VI Chase, staged annually on Boxing Day, Kempton Park is situated on the A308, known locally as Staines Road East, in Sunbury-on-Thames, Surrey. At a distance of 16 miles, it has the distinction of being the closest racecourse to the City of London and, since the Flat turf course was replaced with Polytrack in 2006, has become one of the busiest courses in the country. For those taking a break from the best casino bonus in usa casinous, this racecourse is certainly a fun spot to be!

A right-handed, practically flat course, Kempton Park was established in 1878, by the recently-incorporated Kempton Park Race Course Company Limited. The company actually had seven original shareholders, but just one of them, Samuel Henry Hyde, is generally considered the founding father of the racecourse. The first meeting at Kempton Park was held on July 18, 1878.

Sandown Park, on the other hand, is situated on Portsmouth Road in Esher, Surrey, approximately six miles southeast of Kempton Park and approximately 17 miles southwest of the City of London. Nowadays, Sandown is renowned as the home of the Coral-Eclipse, which was inaugurated in 1886, at the time under the auspices of Leopold de Rothschild, and the Bet365 Gold Cup, formerly the Whitbread Gold Cup, which was established in 1957.

An essentially galloping course, with a stiff uphill finish, Sandown had the distinction of being the first modern, purpose-built racecourse in the country and the first to charge an admission fee (of half a crown, or 2/6, which is the equivalent of approximately £8 in modern terms). Under the auspices of Sir Wilford Brett, the brother of Sir William Brett (later Viscount Esher), and brothers Owen and Hwfa Williams, Sandown Park was developed on farmland attached to Sandown House. The first race meeting at the venue took place on April 22, 1875.