Kavanagh: Ireland Ready to Race With a Week's Notice

A week would be all racing in Ireland needed to restart in the event of an all-clear from the government, with the sport remaining "racing ready" after the latest meeting of the Horse Racing Ireland board.

Ireland remains in lockdown until at least May 4, but the country's chief medical officer April 17 gave a positive outlook on the spread and impact of the coronavirus, providing some optimism that restrictions may potentially start to lift in the near future.

While any announcement from government is key to the resumption of racing, Brian Kavanagh, Horse Racing Ireland's chief executive, suggested how the strategies put in place by the sport's authorities allowed for a quick response.

"The country is locked down until May 4, and there is some indication that the government might indicate in advance of that what sort of plan they might have to relax some of the restrictions if they were able to do that, and we would be hopeful that racing would be a part of that," he said. "We've told racecourses to remain 'racing ready.' You would need a few days to advertise a program, take entries and things like that, but within seven days of an announcement, we could be racing. It just depends on when that announcement comes."

He added: "We did race behind closed doors before the shutdown, and there are obviously a number of other countries that are racing behind closed doors at the moment, so we're making all those cases. But it's a decision for the medical authorities rather than the racing authorities at the moment."

Infections and deaths from COVID-19 have been lower in Ireland compared to other European countries such as the U.K., France, Italy, and Spain.

Dr. Tony Holohan outlined how social distancing measures brought in to "suppress the virus in the community" had "flattened (the) curve so much that there is no peak."

As of 5 p.m. Saturday, there had been 13,980 positive tests for COVID-19 in Ireland with 530 deaths.