On a Saturday in which most of the United States was blanketed by rain clouds, wagering on the Kentucky Derby set a record for the fourth year in a row while viewership for a live broadcast of the race soared to its highest level since 1986.
While adverse weather in Louisville and the surrounding area can dampen ontrack business for the Derby, the opposite is true when poor weather conditions keep people indoors far afield of the Derby’s local market. On Saturday, much of the Midwest, the entire Eastern seaboard, and large swaths of the West were covered in clouds, limiting the outdoor options for the first Saturday in May.
Total commingled wagering on the Derby itself, including all multi-race bets ending in the race, soared 12.2 percent to a record $222.6 million, according to the chart of the race, fueled by a 17.4 percent gain in win, place, and show bets on the race. Handle on the Derby and other high-profile races have been recently benefiting from the widespread adoption of sports betting in states across the United States, a trend that is reflected in a recent run-up in the straight pools.
For the entire 14-race card at Churchill on Saturday, handle was a record $336.59 million, a 9.7 percent gain over the $306.92 million record set last year, according to the charts. The same number of horses, 155, competed on this year’s Derby card as last year, even though this year’s card had far worse weather conditions than last year.
According to NBC, the Derby portion of its broadcast averaged 17.7 million viewers across all of the company’s platforms, the largest viewership number since 1986, when viewers had far fewer options on their television dials (and no internet). Aside from the network’s Summer Olympics coverage last year, it was the largest audience for a Saturday program on NBC since an NFL playoff game in 2024, the network said.
Although national weather conditions were a significant factor in this year’s Derby metrics, there also is no question that the Derby has been on an astounding run over the last decade despite the stagnation pervasive in the sport of racing overall. In 2017, betting on the entire Derby card was $209.2 million, a figure that has now been exceeded by the race itself. All-sources wagering on the Derby card is now 60.9 percent higher than just eight years ago.
Total commingled betting on the Derby and Friday’s Oaks card was $410.49 million, according to the charts. Betting on the Oaks card itself was down 1.8 percent compared to last year, but the card’s appeal to bettors suffered from heavy favorites in three of the races comprising the late pick six that ended in the Oaks. Like the Derby a day later, straight betting on the Oaks was up substantially, 12 percent, while exacta betting was up 8.8 percent.
Most sports betting apps offer wagering on racing, even if the sport is a far less popular product than other offerings. For big races, the apps typically tie their promotions to straight wagers, a strategy that also is employed by the most popular racing-specific betting apps.
This year’s Derby, which had one fewer horse in the field than last year, drew an astounding $122.47 million in straight bets, while exacta betting jumped 11.7 percent. Among all same-race wagers on the race, straight bets were 60 percent of the total, up from 50 percent of the total just four years ago.
Trifecta and superfecta betting on the race each jumped a little more than 7 percent compared to last year, according to the charts.
Churchill Downs Inc. has poured nearly $1 billion over the last two decades into renovations at the track designed to create hundreds of pricing tiers for tickets, a strategy that has served the company in spades, with massive gains in Derby week revenue (aside from the COVID-impacted years of 2020 and 2021).
But just prior to the Derby this year, Churchill put on hold three renovation projects that were expected to cost $900 million, including the construction of three infield buildings that would have offered infield patrons some cover from the rain. The uncertainty in the overall economy brought on by the policies of the administration of President Donald Trump was cited as the reason for the delay.
On the same conference call in which company officials outlined their concerns about their inability to estimate their future costs, the company’s executives acknowledged weakness at its casinos, especially among the lower tier of the casino’s demographics. That day, Churchill’s stock price dropped 16.2 percent, to $87.99. The stock opened at $90.66 on Monday.
:: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.