Cheltenham: assessing the excess of enjoyment!

CHELTENHAM is all about the consumption of enjoyment and plenty of it! It’s basically one giant party where everyone the length and breadth of Ireland and Britain is invited. Four days ingesting the greatest show on turf is part and parcel of what the festival is all about.

Ted Walsh once famously called it ‘a dinosaur’ as it now rules the entire National Hunt calendar. Everything gears towards it and we’re not complaining in the slightest.

But have you ever stopped to wonder how much of a good time is actually had over four days in March? This should give you an idea. Jockeys look away now…

• 280,000 pints of Guinness will be downed at the festival.

• 3 tonnes of smoked Salmon and 2 tonnes of beef consumed.

• 9 tonnes of potatoes.

• 130,000 pints of lager drank.

• 122,000 bottles of wine.

• 30,000 bottles of champagne.

• 8,000 gallons of tea and coffee.

• 50,000 bread rolls.

• 25,000 portions of chips.

• An average daily capacity of 68,000.

• An estimated 14,000 Irish racing fans to attend the festival each day.

• Over £6 million will be taken in bets over the festival.

• 6,000 Cheltenham staff employed over 4 days.

• 400 chefs will be enduring the festival ‘heat in the kitchen’.

• £100,000,000, the estimated worth of the festival to the Gloucestershire economy.