RTÉ’s coverage of racing is a huge concern

Sir,

Let’s face up to the fact that RTÉ does not care much for Irish horse racing.

If it did it would have given the Group 1 Keeneland Phoenix Stakes a mention or showed the last 10 seconds of the race in the sport section of the Six One News on Sunday last.

I find that RTÉ treats horse racing as an afterthought. There was not a single mention of a quality Group 1 race after GAA, English soccer, golf, ladies rugby and under-18 basketball.

It’s not as if horse racing is a minor sport – total attendance at Irish racecourses is well over a million each year. Racing is the top professional sport in Ireland by a country mile.

The question must be asked, what the heck do they know about sport in RTÉ? It must be a bubble of people who don’t understand the difference between what they like and what their responsibility as a public broadcaster is. I would be surprised if anyone at RTÉ can point out a sport that we are consistently better at than horse racing and boxing.

It’s time someone in Horse Racing Ireland called in RTÉ and asked some serious questions about their poor racing news on sports programmes and why horse racing, our best professional sport, comes behind minor sports in terms of news value. – Yours etc.,

JOHNNY LYNCH,

Rye View,

Leixlip,

Co Kildare.