Italian horse racing world is facing a structural crisis that seems irreversible. A poor bettors generational replacement, together with years of reckless management and bad political strategies by UNIRE (National Union Increase Horse Breeds) led to a frightful crisis, made even worse by the recession that’s affecting the country. Numbers are pretty explicit, from owners prizes halved year by hear to a constant huge bets decline.With a general strike made by the Italian horse racing Federation, all Italian racecourses have been closed for months at the beginning of 2012. The San Siro racecourse in Milan, the geographical focus of this reportage, did not made exceptions.The horse racing industry provides employment for 60-70thousand people and cover an area of 90.000 hectares of land across Italy, with 42 racecourses between public and private. The San Siro structure, which is divided into a harness racing track and one for flat racing, was born from a project of engineer Julius Valerius in 1888. It spreads on a 1,4million square meters area, 45thousand of it are reserved to the public, 450thousand to the racing tracks, 145thousand to logistics, and the remaining is reserved to green spaces. With an indiser point of view, this reportage aims to tell the state of this sector general crisis and to understand the phenomenon, a centuries old discipline that might disappear forever.
Horse racing crisis
Italy
YEAR:
Dec. 2011 – Mar. 2012
LOCATION:
Milan, Italy
PUBLICATION & AWARD:
– The New York Times, Lens
– Leica Talent 24×36, 2012