Gold Cup rivalry puts horse racing back on sporting map

It has been called horseracing's equivalent of Ali v Foreman or Coe v Ovett, with one bookmaker dubbing it the War of the Wolds. But the sport hopes tomorrow's third Gold Cup showdown between Kauto Star and Denman will be more than a thrilling climax to the Cheltenham festival, also providing a template to take it to new audiences and broaden its appeal among women and young people. The PR initiatives built around the clash have ranged from the production of thousands of bespoke beermats featuring the two "superhorses", who train alongside one another at Paul Nicholls's yard in Somerset, to selling scarves declaring allegiance to one or the other. Racing for Change, an industry body that for the last year has been attempting to encourage a factionalised sport to consider new ideas, hopes to promote other big races during the season in a similar way by building a "narrative" around them. Before this year's Cheltenham, Racing for Change arranged for world heavyweight boxing champion David Haye to visit Nicholls's yard and oversaw a concerted push to take champion jockey Tony McCoy, who will ride Denman, beyond the sports pages into women's lifestyle magazines and weekend supplements. "The first stage of Racing for Change – getting the bigger stories out to a broader audience – has happened largely because of the brilliant narrative Cheltenham provides. We've got the stories, we just need to be better at telling them," said chief executive Rod Street. It hopes to make more of the personalities of the jockeys and their horses, evoking an earlier age when the likes of Lester Piggott and Willie Carson were household names. Today, most people outside the sport would struggle to name any beyond Frankie Dettori. While it will be hard for any storyline to match an equine rivalry that has developed into one of the most analysed and intriguing in sport, chief executive Rod Street today said there were valuable lessons to be learned. He said: "There is nothing about the core product that we want to change that the aficionados should be concerned about, but we do want new people to engage and to make racing easier to follow." Street could have asked Rupert Murdoch, who has some experience in repackaging sports to profitable effect, for some tips. He was at Cheltenham to watch his daughter, Elisabeth Murdoch, ride the Nicholls-trained gelding Al Amaan in the ladies' charity race. Murdoch, chief executive of TV production company Shine, started well but was not the first jockey to fade up the fabled Cheltenham hill and trailed in towards the back of the field. Street said most jockeys had welcomed the plans and put themselves forward for media training. But others have sounded a note of caution. Kauto Star's jockey Ruby Walsh, who this week broke the record for riding the most winners at the festival, has said the horses should speak for themselves. "If I sell my soul to the devil and stand in front of every TV camera, that's not going to make more people go racing, is it? Or, I don't think it is. You make more people come racing by the entertainment on the track, not off it." Racing for Change has floated a range of ideas, some of which have been welcomed and some of which have attracted opposition and even ridicule. They range from decimalising odds to make betting less daunting, to listing the Christian names of jockeys on race cards, and organising midweek race nights where two "teams" of horses headed by celebrities would go head to head. It has already produced a list of changes, including a new ownership club aimed at young adults and a requirement to show photo finishes on big screens at courses, that it promises to introduce by June. Other plans would include a drive to harness social networking websites to target young people, a push to increase the number of children involved with educational visits to racecourses and an initiative aimed at university students. "It's about creating human interest. It's not just about the horses, or the jockeys, but making the most of all our assets." With question marks over the amount of money flowing into racing from the levy imposed on bookmakers, competition from the popularity of football betting, pressure on sponsors and fierce competition from other leisure activities, racing faces serious hurdles. Edward Gillespie, the Cheltenham racecourse managing director, said one of the biggest lessons that could be learned from tomorrow's sold-out Gold Cup day was from the eclectic crowd it attracts. At Cheltenham the 215,000 ticket holders are a wide-ranging mix of lads in jeans, tweed-suited racing folk, and a corporate crowd that has returned in greater numbers than 2009 but is still far from pre-recession levels. "It lacks arrogance, this event, and it lacks pretension," said Gillespie. "Therefore, people equipped with just a little bit of knowledge can go quite a long way. By the time you have finished your pint or your lunch, you know enough to have an opinion." Some bookmakers have given a lukewarm response to some of the Racing for Change proposals, particularly the plan to decimalise odds, which they claim would be expensive and impractical. William Hill's director of racing, David Hood, said: "It's a work of pure fiction. It is ill-conceived and not thought through. There has been no consideration of the sorts of changes required. We are very supportive of Racing for Change, but only when they enter into dialogue with the bookmakers, who know how to run a profitable business." Kauto Star Jockey Ruby Walsh Trainer Paul Nicholls Owner Clive Smith Date of birth 19 March 2000, Le Lion d'Angers, France Total prize money £2.12m Nickname The Extra-Terrestrial Wins/starts 20/33 Cheltenham Gold Cup wins Two Odds: 5-6 favourite Denman Jockey Tony McCoy Trainer Paul Nicholls Owners Paul Barber/Maggie Findlay Date of birth 17 April 2000, County Cork, Ireland Total prize money £904,074 Nickname The Tank Wins/starts 15/20 Cheltenham Gold Cup wins One Odds: 9-2