There was excitement, optimism and general delight when Galway announced they had submitted a detailed proposal to the Government on June 28th.

The Curragh had just successfully hosted a pilot crowd of 1,000 for the Irish Derby, there were crowds at Mount Juliet golf course for each day of the Irish Open that same week and the GAA also welcomed back spectators for inter-county matches, with more and more fans expected to attend single games in the coming weeks.

Today, 16 days since their proposal, Galway have yet to hear a single word back from the Government on whether they can go ahead fully, partially or not at all. This, despite the fact that it was stressed in the proposal, and many times since through local politicians and by other means, that the racecourse would need a quick decision in order to begin work on the special logistical plans in the proposal.

The lack of response from the Government is unacceptable, disappointing and quite damning when you compare it to the treatment of other sports.

Only last Thursday, Minister of State for Sport Jack Chambers announced that he expected more and more fans would be able to attend sporting events this summer. Yesterday GAA president Larry McCarthy has said he’s hopeful of crowds up to 36,000 attending the All Ireland semi finals and maybe more for the finals. The IRFU are very hopeful of hosting bigger crowds for upcoming Ireland games in the autumn series after hosting crowds of 3,000 and 6,000 for international games at the Aviva Stadium in the last week.

The only thing racing has got is the Derby day pilot event which saw 1,000 people attend the Curragh, an event which went off without a hitch safety-wise but has seemingly failed to convince the powers that be that other racecourses can host crowds above the current level of 500.

Frustration

The frustration from Galway is completely understandable. Speaking after the Summer Festival was held behind closed doors last year, chief executive Michael Moloney said that racing behind closed doors cost the track a seven-figure sum and that it would be unsustainable to continue without crowds.

That should be obvious to anyone, not least the people in charge of our country. Galway is a huge establishment with comparatively huge overheads to your average Irish racecourse. The bottom line revolves around the Summer Festival.

Some people inside the industry have suggested that plans to host 5,000 people a day were on the ambitious side but if Galway goes another year without any sort of significant income from ticketing fees and hospitality, it’ll start to be ambitious that the course can survive.

“At this stage I can’t understand why a decision can’t be made in relation to our event but unfortunately it hasn’t been,” track chief executive Michael Moloney said last week.

“We’re trying everything possible to try and encourage a decision but we haven’t progressed really. It has been made very much aware that a decision is needed and required, it’s not like a GAA stadium where people go in and sit down, people are at the races for five and six hours and there’s a huge number of things that go along with that.”

The most frustrating part is that we know that the chances of transmitting the Covid virus outside is significantly lower than inside and that Irish racecourses are perfectly safe in this regard. Dr Jennifer Pugh proudly made testament to that in the Big Interview on Saturday when she said not a single Covid case had been transmitted on an Irish racecourse over the last year.

That is a significant sample size and the Derby day pilot event was real evidence that the successful measures that have been in place to ensure this perfect record can be broadened out for a bigger crowd, which it should be said, a large proportion will be vaccinated.

Secure environment

A quick browse through Booking.com and you can clearly see that hotel rooms are scarce during race week. Town will be busy, as it should be, and wouldn’t it make perfect sense to take 5,000 people from that area into a safe and secure environment at the races?

But maybe that would make too much sense for a Government that often seems to prefer the nonsensical - €9 meals, unvaccinated restaurant and bar staff serving the vaccinated, allowing 18,000 to attend games in Croke Park this weekend but not 5,000 in Galway racecourse at the end of the month.

Not being able to attend Galway for another year will be a huge blow for so many people that plan their summer around Ballybrit at the end of July, start of August. After two years of basically no crowds, will people return next year - is it an absolute given?

Aside from that, the Galway brings in €60 million to the local economy and while just having the races on will be of benefit to hotels and outside bars that people will frequent to watch the action at the end of the month, the racecourse itself is bleeding badly and it deserves a hell of a lot more than the silent treatment it has been getting from the Government.