National Racehorse Week’s community programme expands with Racing Foundation funding

A record-breaking National Racehorse Week (NRW) community programme took place in August, reaching more people than ever before and strengthening the sport’s connection with local communities and new audiences.

The Racing Foundation has acted as the principal funder of NRW since inception, with this year’s funding supporting the development and extension of the community programme with support from Godolphin and the Racing Post.

Running between 23 and 31 August 2025, NRW delivered 56 free community events, engaging 3,100 individuals from more than 30 charities and organisations across Britain. The programme ran alongside more than 90 public open days, and, with support from British racing’s community lead Racing Together, enabled audiences with little or no connection to racing to go behind the scenes of the sport and experience the magic of the racehorse.

NRW’s charity partners included Mind, Tickets4Troops, Box4Kids, the African Caribbean Centre Leicester, Communicare and Riding for the Disabled. Groups visited training yards, studs and rehoming centres nationwide, while 16 current and former racehorses travelled to schools, cities, community spaces, care homes and hospices, providing many participants with their first encounter with a thoroughbred.

Collaborations with wider equestrian disciplines included The Pony Club’s charity outreach programme and the British Horse Society’s Changing Lives Through Horses programme, whose beneficiaries attended bespoke NRW events including a private yard tour at Dan Skelton Racing, hands-on retraining activities and a chance to meet Grand National winner Neptune Collonges.

Tansy Challis, Chief Executive of the Racing Foundation, added “The Racing Foundation is proud to have been the principle funder of National Racehorse Week since inception, and in particular to help develop and extend the community programme, with support from Godolphin and the Racing Post. We were thrilled to see a record number of events this year, with so many members of the community connecting with racehorses for the very first time. Once again, National Racehorse Week has demonstrated the positive impact our sport can have and we would like to thank all those from within our sport who hosted and delivered a community event.”

Since launching in 2021, NRW has delivered 65,000 free places for the public and staged more than 150 community events. Its events in 2025 continued to evidence the power of connection between people and horses, with 83% of community event attendees entirely new to racing, and 73% reporting improved mental wellbeing as a result of their visit.

Read more on The Racing Foundation’s website.