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Glorious Goodwood: All the facts and figures
Glorious Goodwood is here - and there are some remarkable facts and figures that show just how big an event it is.
History of Racecourse• Created by the 3rd Duke of Richmond, the first public racing took place at Goodwood in 1802
• The first running of the Goodwood Cup was in 1812
• The Festival, originally 2 days, was first moved to the end of July in 1814 and became known as 'Goodwood Week'
• The Queen opened the March Grandstand in 1980
• The Panama hat first made its appearance at the Festival in 1907
The Venue• The total racing surface covers an area of 35 acres
• In order to prepare the racing surface, one specialist tractor operates for 960 hours throughout the season
• The total area of the Goodwood racecourse site is over 500 acres
• The racecourse requires 9 miles of running rail
• The longest race of the festival is 2 miles 5 furlongs
• 600 bags of fertiliser are used throughout the year to prepare the racing surface – a total of 52,000kg
• 30 tons of topsoil will be needed to repair the racing surface after Glorious Goodwood
Attendance• 102,068 people attended Glorious Goodwood in 2008
• The two busiest days in 2008 were Friday and Saturday, which attracted crowds of 23,135 and 24,796 people respectively
Prize Fund & Competition• The total prize fund for the festival is 2.19 million
• The maximum total prize fund for a race is 300,000 offered for the BGC Sussex Stakes (Group 1)
• 458 horses competed at Glorious Goodwood in 2008
Betting/Tote• The Totepool estimated turnover for the week is 2,750,000
• The estimated number of bets placed with the tote at the festival is 300,000 (60,000 per day)
• There will be in excess of 250 staff on course
• Totesport (with 4 betting shops) has an estimated turnover of 750,000
TV
• Glorious Goodwood 2008 was watched by 3.2 million people which equates to 5.7% of the UK population
• Glorious Goodwood audience figures averaged 565,000 over the 5 days
• The peak for the festival was on Saturday when the audience figure reached 650,000 (7.4% audience share)
• Channel 4 Racing will utilise 29 cameras over the five-day broadcast
• Vortex, a new aerial camera system which will be used, has the ability to lift a camera from ground level to 30 metres in 15 seconds
• A team of 80 technicians and production crew will oversee the five-day broadcast
• Channel 4 Racing will broadcast for a total of 13 terrestrial hours during the festival
Racecards• 59,000 Racecards have been printed for the five days
Personnel• Glorious Goodwood will be staffed by 350 Goodwood Racecourse staff
• Goodwood Racecourse employs 8 permanent groundstaff and will utilise a groundstaff team of 25 people during Glorious Goodwood
• A team of 80 technicians and production crew will oversee the five-day Channel 4 Racing broadcast
• The parking operation will consist of 70 staff operating 15 car parks covering a total of 6,500 parking spaces
• 50 cleaning staff will be on site each day
Website
• During the week before and the week of Glorious Goodwood 2008 there were over 704,797 visitors to the website – an average of 54,000 visitors per day
• During this time 266,702 web-pages were viewed on the Goodwood site, 87,518 of which were horse racing pages
• 'Glorious Goodwood' was searched by over 6,000 people during this time
Parking
• Over 30,000 vehicles, including 700 coaches will be parked during the festival
• Over 600 cars will be valet parked during Glorious Goodwood
• The parking operation will consist of 70 staff operating 15 car parks covering a total of 6,500 parking spaces
• Over 6,000 vehicles will be parked on most days of the festival
• On average, around 165 coaches will be parked each day
Air Traffic
• The on-site helicopter pad will accommodate over 150 helicopter movements will take place over the five days
• Guests and competitors arriving by helicopter will be shuttled to the main facility by six vehicles
Catering
• 4,000 organic burgers, 1,000 organic sausages, and 650kgs of organic roast beef will be sold at the Festival
• 31,500 strawberries will be given away at the Strawberry Tower
• 250kg of fruit will be chopped for Pimms throughout the event
• 9,500 afternoon teas will be served over the five days
• 500 lobsters will be served throughout the festival
• 5,000 meals for operational staff will be provided over the five days
• 70,400 pints of beer will be poured
• 35,200 jugs of Pimms will be served
• 6,700 bottles/40,200 glasses of house champagne will be served
• 4,800 bottles/28,800 glasses of Veuve Cliquot Yellow Label champagne will be served
• In total, 11,500 bottles/69,000 glasses of champagne will be sold at the festival
Come back to this website for previews, tips, reports, pictures and results throughout the festival
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Friday 25 May 2012
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