Channel 4 Threatens to Pull Plug on Racing

The future of horse-racing on TV was thrown into doubt today after Channel 4 threatened to pull the plug on its loss-making coverage at the end of next year, unless the sport helps to fund the broadcaster's TV rights and production costs.

Channel 4 head of sport David Kerr said its coverage of the sport was no longer sustainable because viewers were too old to attract enough advertising.

"Sadly, racing hardly attracts the younger viewer. Therefore it is not particularly attractive to advertisers.

"It has a loyal, committed audience, but we still have to address the economics and that means finding external funding," he told the Daily Mail.

He said there was an additional financial limits because TV coverage of the sport could not be sponsored by bookmakers under Ofcom rules.

A Channel 4 spokesman today confirmed it was considering ending its coverage, pointing out that in most other countries the horse racing industry pays broadcasters to televise the sport.

"When a race is on terrestrial TV, betting goes up 250%. The people who really benefit from terrestrial coverage are the bookmakers. So why should we be making a loss on this to fund other people's profits?" he said.

"We spend several million pounds a year on production costs and rights. If the [horse racing industry] want us to carry on covering the sport, they are going to have to pay for it.

"Channel 4 loses a lot of money on racing and it doesn't really do much for us in ratings or representational terms."

The broadcaster first took over weekday afternoon racing coverage from ITV in March 1984 and covered the Derby for the first time in June that year.

Channel 4 Racing began broadcasting at weekends in October the following year, when ITV's Saturday afternoon show, World of Sport, dropped its ITV Seven horse racing coverage.

Since then the broadcaster has become synonymous with horse racing with access to some of the biggest courses including Cheltenham, Newmarket, Epsom and Goodwood.

The Morning Line, Channel 4's Saturday morning preview show presented by Lesley Graham, was launched in October 1989 and has become essential viewing for the industry and punters alike.

But the sport has been under increasing strain as TV coverage became fragmented. Earlier this year a tie-up between Channel 4, BSkyB and Arena Leisure collapsed just two years into a 10-year deal because of disappointing revenues.

Attheraces continues as a pay-TV service run by BSkyB and Arena Leisure but the terrestrial TV rights it owned were ultimately handed over to Channel 4 as part of a new deal.

The Attheraces consortium caused huge divisions in the sport - with some of the biggest courses, including Cheltenham, Newmarket, Epsom and Glorious Goodwood refusing to license their meetings and setting up their own channel, Racing UK.

John McCririck, Channel 4's flamboyant betting expert, said the network got more viewers from broadcasting "an old black and white movie that costs them nothing to put on" than horse racing.

He said it was time the sport's governing body, the British Horseracing Board, "faced up to the facts".

Channel 4 will be renegotiating its TV rights contracts for horse racing, which run to the end of 2005, over the next three months.