{"id":9152,"date":"2024-02-14T14:06:56","date_gmt":"2024-02-14T14:06:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bettingwebsites.org.uk\/?page_id=9152"},"modified":"2024-02-15T14:39:42","modified_gmt":"2024-02-15T14:39:42","slug":"how-many-horse-races-have-more-than-8-runners","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.bettingwebsites.org.uk\/articles\/horse-racing\/how-many-horse-races-have-more-than-8-runners\/","title":{"rendered":"How Many Horse Races Have More Than 8 Runners?"},"content":{"rendered":"
For a horse race to be entertaining, and for it to hold any value whatsoever from a betting perspective, it needs to have a decent number of runners.<\/p>\n
We wouldn\u2019t want all races to be as busy as The Grand National, because that would make the whole industry more akin to playing the lottery than real betting, but equally, a field of 4 runners is boring to watch and easier to predict, meaning odds hold less value in most cases.<\/p>\n
For the majority of races then, the key to getting things right is balance, but ideally you would have at least 8 horses taking part.<\/p>\n
This is because, as well as being more entertaining to watch and more difficult for bookies to predict, there would be 3 places paid out instead of two, which is more favourable for place betting.<\/p>\n
This is the case for races of between 8 and 15 runners, so we can consider 8 or more runners to be the optimal range for the majority of races.<\/p>\n
The British Horse Racing Authority (BHA) has kept data on this sort of thing since 1995, so we can see how many races have 8 or more runners, and how often this sweet spot is hit.<\/p>\n
Spoilers<\/strong>: it\u2019s not nearly as often as bettors would like.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I will start this section by saying that signs of improvement have been mildly encouraging, but nevertheless, the number of horse races with more than 8 runners has declined since the BHA first started keeping records in 1995.<\/p>\n Back in the early 2000s it was common to see as many as 70%-80% of all races featuring at least 8 horses, but from 2006 to 2014 there was a dramatic decline all the way down to 59%, which is close to an all-time low.<\/p>\n Here you can see the average percentage of races that contained 8 runners or more from 1995 to 2023:<\/p>\n You will notice that in the earlier years there was a bumpy but nevertheless considerable rise in the numbers, before the number of races with more than 8 runners fell off a cliff.<\/p>\nThe Number of Races With More Than 8 Runners Has Fallen<\/h2>\n
\n\n
\n \nYear<\/th>\n Average<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n \n 2023<\/td>\n 62.47%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2022<\/td>\n 57.69%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2021<\/td>\n 62.24%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2020<\/td>\n 71.26%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2019<\/td>\n 64.08%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2018<\/td>\n 61.58%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2017<\/td>\n 62.98%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2016<\/td>\n 63.86%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2015<\/td>\n 61.74%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2014<\/td>\n 59.19%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2013<\/td>\n 63.14%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2012<\/td>\n 67.89%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2011<\/td>\n 66.14%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2010<\/td>\n 71.23%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2009<\/td>\n 74.77%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2008<\/td>\n 77.09%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2007<\/td>\n 78.98%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2006<\/td>\n 79.47%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2005<\/td>\n 81.94%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2004<\/td>\n 78.28%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2003<\/td>\n 70.74%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2002<\/td>\n 74.81%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2001<\/td>\n 79.97%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 2000<\/td>\n 71.54%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 1999<\/td>\n 70.54%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 1998<\/td>\n 70.16%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 1997<\/td>\n 65.6%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 1996<\/td>\n 68.01%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 1995<\/td>\n 62.06%<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n