The card
Racecards Today: Irish Horse Racing Cards and Non-Runners
Today's racecards load in the feed with the declared runners and any non-runners. The rest of the page is a key to the card: form figures, weights, ratings and the small letters that change a price.
By Conor FurlongChecked 18+
18+ only. Gambling can become a problem. Set a limit before you start. Help and support
Racecards today for every Irish meeting are in the feed below, with declared runners, riders, weights and non-runners as they are announced. Tomorrow's cards follow once final declarations are in; we never fill a card in by hand or guess at a field.
Course First race Code Going Note Punchestown 13:05 Flat Fixture moved from Galway after the Tuesday Galway Flat meeting was cancelled for waterlogging; official going not found Dundalk All-weather Listed for Thursday 29 Oct on the HRI site and a Tipp FM report; first race time and going not confirmed Bath 13:12 Flat Heavy Afternoon meeting, seven races, first race David Cole Memorial EBF Novice Stakes Ffos Las 13:30 National Hunt Heavy Afternoon jump meeting, seven races; going as shown on the Racing Post card for the first race Stratford 13:20 National Hunt Soft, good to soft in places Afternoon jump meeting, seven races Southwell 18:30 All-weather Standard (AW) Twilight meeting; 18:30 is the time of the AWC Season 14 Has Begun Handicap (Div 2) card, not confirmed as the first race
A card is a compressed form book. Ten minutes with the key below will save you backing a horse on its name. Betting is strictly 18+.
Racecards today: a key to every column
Layouts differ between providers, but an Irish horse racing card carries the same building blocks:
| Column | What it means |
|---|---|
| Number | Saddlecloth number. In handicaps the top weight is usually number 1. |
| Draw | Stall position, shown on Flat cards only. On some tracks and distances it matters a great deal. |
| Form | Recent finishing positions, newest on the right. |
| Age and weight | Weight carried in stones and pounds, including any penalty. |
| OR | Official rating, the handicapper's assessment of ability. |
| Jockey | The rider, with any claim in brackets: an allowance off the weight for a less experienced rider. |
| Trainer | The licensed trainer. |
| Days | Days since the horse last ran. |
| C, D, CD, BF | Course winner, distance winner, course-and-distance winner, beaten favourite last time. |
Reading the form figures
Numbers 1 to 9 are finishing positions; 0 means the horse finished outside the first nine. Letters record what went wrong over jumps or in running: F fell, U unseated rider, P pulled up, B brought down, R refused. A hyphen marks a break between seasons, and a slash a longer gap. So an illustrative string such as 3-21P reads: third last season, then a second, a win, and pulled up most recently. That last letter is the one to ask about.
The figures give a position, not the story. A fourth beaten a short head in a big handicap can be better form than a win in a weak race, which is why the full form and the ratings sit underneath every card in the feed.
Non-runners today and what they do to your bet
Horses can be withdrawn after declarations because of the ground, a vet's certificate or a late setback. If your selection is a non-runner on the day, the stake is refunded. If another horse comes out late and the market is not re-formed, Rule 4 trims the winnings on the rest of the field.
A worked example: EUR 10 on a 5/1 winner, with a 3/1 shot withdrawn. The 3/1 band carries a 25p deduction, so the EUR 50 winnings become EUR 37.50 and the return is EUR 47.50. The full deduction table is on our results page.
Yesterday's non-runners matter after the event too: if a bet was settled oddly, check the result for late withdrawals before you query it.
Tomorrow's cards, Saturday and Sunday racing
Cards for the next day appear once the declaration stage has closed and the fields are published. Until then, the race is a list of entries, and many of those will not run. Saturday and Sunday cards behave the same way, though the big Saturday handicaps attract longer lists of entries and more defections.
Festival race cards: Cheltenham, Fairyhouse and the big meetings
Festival cards get the same treatment in the feed. Cheltenham runs four days in March, seven races a day: the Tuesday card is built around the Champion Hurdle and the Wednesday card around the Queen Mother Champion Chase. Fairyhouse's Easter cards carry the Irish Grand National on the Monday. For previews of the meetings, see the Cheltenham Festival and Punchestown pages.
Count the runners on a festival card before an each-way bet: the field size and the race type decide how many places are paid. Our each-way guide has the full ladder of terms.
Greyhound race cards
A greyhound card is shorter: up to six dogs, one per trap, with each dog's recent runs, sectional and finishing times, and the grade of the race. Greyhound Racing Ireland, the body once known as the Irish Greyhound Board, licenses the stadiums where the Irish meetings are run. The greyhound racing page covers the tracks and results.
Virtual racing cards
Bookmakers also run virtual racing: computer-generated races on invented courses, every few minutes. The card looks like a real one, with names and prices, but there is no form to read. The outcome is decided by a random number generator, and the prices carry the firm's margin. Treat it as a game of chance, not a form puzzle.
Where to bet once you have read the card
Bet only with a bookmaker that holds a betting licence from the Gambling Regulatory Authority of Ireland; online firms have needed one since 1 July 2026. The list below is drawn from that register and ranked by our form figures.
| No. | Runner | Form | Licence | Verdict | Links |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  bet365Hillside (Europe) ENC | 1-1-2-2-3 | GRAI licence (betting) | NAP | Visit |
| 2 |  Paddy PowerPPB Counterparty Services Limited | 1-1-2-2-3 | GRAI licence (betting) | NAP | Visit |
| 3 |  BetfairPPB Counterparty Services Limited | 1-1-4-4-4 | GRAI licence (betting) | NAP | Visit |
| 4 |  BoyleSportsBoylesports (Gibraltar) Limited | 1-2-1-2-3 | GRAI licence (betting) | Each-way | Visit |
| 5 |  William HillWH Ireland Limited | 1-1-3-2-3 | GRAI licence (betting) | Each-way | Visit |
| 6 |  LadbrokesLC International Limited | 1-1-3-2-4 | GRAI licence (betting) | Each-way | Visit |
| 7 |  BetVictorBV Gaming Limited | 1-2-5-4-5 | GRAI licence (betting) | Each-way | Visit |
| 8 |  LivescorebetLiveScore Betting and Gaming (Gibraltar) Limited | 1-2-3-4-4 | GRAI licence (betting) | Each-way | Visit |
Form reads licence, markets, payments, safer-play tools, terms; 1 is best. How we rate. 18+ only.
A full card every day is a lot of temptation. Pick your races, fix a budget and use the deposit limits your bookmaker must offer; the safer gambling page explains how.
Readers' questions
- When are tomorrow's racecards published?
- Once final declarations close and the fields are confirmed. Before that only the entries are known, and many entries will not run.
- What happens to my bet if my horse is a non-runner?
- On a normal day-of-race bet the stake is refunded. On an ante-post bet it is usually lost, unless the bookmaker offered non-runner no bet terms on that race.
- What does OR mean on a racecard?
- Official rating: the handicapper's figure for the horse's ability. In a handicap it sets the weight each horse carries.
- Are virtual races worth studying?
- No. Virtual races are decided by a random number generator. There is no form to read, only a price with a margin built in.