Entering a race

Entering a Live race takes a few taps: pick the race on the card, pick the horse, choose how it should be ridden and confirm. Until entries close you can still change your mind. Here is what each part of the entry sheet means.

#How to enter

1. 1
   Open the race card and choose a race that is still open. The card shows the next day of race meetings (3 a day, 8 races each). Each race shows its class, trip, surface and going, and how many stables have entered so far: sort by “Most stables” to find the busiest races. The going is the real ground at that course on the day; the race page adds whether it is drying or softening, and This week forecasts the days after the card (see Weather & going).
2. 2
   Pick a horse. The sheet shows how well this race suits it, and why a horse can’t run if it can’t: injured, wrong class, rating out of the band, a licence you don’t hold yet, already raced Live today, or not qualified for the Weekend Feature.
3. 3
   Choose the riding plan: a tactic and a ride intensity. The sheet shows the injury risk for the ride you picked before you commit.
4. 4
   Add any race-day extras or book a jockey if you want them (optional, paid in credits). The risk and the total on the Enter button update as you tick them.
5. 5
   Confirm. The race costs 1 stable entry (2 for Features, Finals and Group races).
6. 6
   Watch it live, or come back later: the result waits in your inbox.

#Reading the racecard

Every race page has a racecard listing the field, printed like the real thing. Before entries close it shows which stables have entered so far and says the Club will fill the field up to its size; once the field locks, every runner has its saddlecloth number and gate. Club horses are marked Club; every other runner shows its owner’s stable. An ordinary race that no stable entered is called off when entries close.

Form and rating come from races already settled, never from this one. More on both in Ratings & form.

#Entries, fees and limits

Live races are paid for from your stable entry bank, not with credits. You get a fresh allowance every local midnight, unused entries roll over up to the bank’s cap, and missing a day is never punished. Story races and the Daily Cup are free. Every Live race also charges a small credit entry fee, 5% of its purse (50 to 1,200 credits; the top classes have a fixed minimum). The entry sheet shows it before you confirm. The whole entry economy is on Credits & entries.

• One horse per stable per Live race. If you already have a runner in a race, enter your next horse in another one.
• A stable can never make up more than half of a field.
• A horse can run one Live race a day (by the race’s UTC date), and at most 3 races a day, Live and Story together. Story races and the Daily Cup don’t use up the Live race.
• The Weekend Feature takes only qualified horses, and the Saturday Plate only horses that ran in that week’s Qualifiers and missed it. Your status for both is on This week; the rules are on Race types.
• Scratching your horse before entries close frees it again, but the entry you spent is gone. If a race is abandoned, your entries come back.
• Mares in foal, injured horses and horses that have stopped racing can’t be entered.

#The paddock and the off

The race page counts down to the off. While entries are open it shows how long you have left; entries close 30 seconds before the off and the field locks. The runners parade in the paddock, with a nameplate for each horse showing its stable and form. In the final seconds they go down to post and the gates load. Then the race goes off and everybody watches it together.

#Tactics

Every horse has a natural running style, set by its genes, and the entry sheet picks it for you. Riding to the natural style is usually best, but you can choose another one when the race calls for it, say a strong early pace that will suit a closer.

#Ride intensity and injury risk

The second half of the plan is how hard the jockey rides. A harder ride buys a little more finishing kick and costs a higher chance of injury. The exact risk for your horse is on the entry sheet before you confirm. Here it is for a real rested horse in its prime, over a mile on good ground:

Low durability, tiredness, racing often, firm or heavy going, long trips, veteran legs and fragile legs all raise the risk too. In Live races, 20% of career-ending injuries are fatal; in Story races and training they never are. See Injuries & insurance.

#Race-day extras & jockeys

When you enter a Live race the sheet offers a few optional extras and a choice of jockey. They are paid in credits with the entry, priced as a share of the race’s purse (so a big race costs more), and every effect is small and published here. None of them can make a horse faster than its genes and condition allow on its best day: they only take away part of a cost the race puts on the horse, or steady its run.

The jockey is picked on the same sheet: your best jockey free at the off rides for nothing, or book a Club freelancer for a fee by grade and purse. Skills, claims and fees are on the Jockeys page.

Here is what the extras do to the injury risk of a real horse in its prime that is still a little tired (600 fatigue), on heavy ground over a mile with a normal ride:

• Soft-ground shoes keep 50% of what soft or heavy going costs a horse that doesn’t handle it, and of the going’s extra injury risk (heavy × 1.4 becomes × 1.2). A horse that loves the mud gains little.
• Firm going costs no pace, so firm-ground shoes only cushion the jar: × 1.3 becomes × 1.15.
• A physio session takes 150 fatigue off before the off, never below zero, so it does nothing for a rested horse. A vet check multiplies the risk by 0.75 and shows as a “Vet-checked” line under the risk.
• The extras and the jockey are printed on the racecard and the result, like headgear on a real card, and they are sealed into the field when entries close, so replays reproduce them.
• Scratch before entries close, or if the race is abandoned, and the extras and the jockey’s fee come back in full. Story races don’t offer them. They are paid in Stable Credits only.