The broadcaster wants to revolutionise televised racing – and is prepared to invest money and resources to do so
There are unlikely to be many mourners when At The Races officially expires at midnight on Monday. After all, and with all due respect to the television channel’s home in Milton Keynes, it is going to a much better place. Just short of its 18th birthday, the adoption papers were signed and approved earlier this year and from Tuesday, it is official. At The Races is part of the Sky Sports “family” now.
The “At The Races” name is old enough for a PR executive with political ambitions called David Cameron to have been peripherally involved with the initial launch in 2000, when few could have guessed that he would one day break the country. At the time, the future of horse racing on television was thought to involve, among other things, broadcasting one race a day in the lunchtime slot once inhabited in the 70s by Fred Trueman’s incomparable Indoor League. And unless my memory is playing up, this actually happened, for six months or so, until the concept was gently laid to rest.
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