Kentucky Derby 2025: Betting Handle Up Amid Rain, Jockey Controversy
Rounding the stretch, it’s the Kentucky Derby for the win as total wagers increased in 2025.
19 Horses competed in this years Kentucky Derby field. © Mathias Reding, Unsplash
Key Facts:
- The 151st Kentucky Derby went off with a hint of controversy.
- The amount wagered across all platforms on Derby Day rose to about $349 million.
- While overall wagering was up 9% YOY, attendance at the event was down.
- Winning jockey, Junior Alvarado, suspended for overuse of whip during race.
Last week, the horse racing elite gathered in Louisville, KY, for the 151st Run For the Roses. The Kentucky Derby is the premier event in horse racing in the US, as it is both the most watched and attended.
It makes up a third of the Triple Crown, in partnership with the Belmont Stakes and the Preakness, but generally garners more attention than its older counterparts.
The race is only a mile and ¼ long, and is open only to three-year-olds, who finish this short race in just over two minutes, giving rise to the moniker, “The Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports”. Interestingly, the course record was set by Secretariat more than 50 years ago at 1:59 seconds.
While there were variations in the generations of descendants from four to seven, every one of the 19 horses in the Derby could trace its lineage back to Big Red, as Secretariat was warmly known.
The 1972 Triple Crown Winner still holds the course record at the Belmont Stakes, as well, where he won by 31 lengths that year.
While the duration may be short, the attention the race draws every year is anything but. Speculation and early betting start months in advance, and Churchill Downs, where the race is run, has a week of festivities leading up to the main event.
Rainy Weather and Lower Attendance
However, rainy weather this year impacted not only the running of the Kentucky Oaks on Friday but also the Derby itself, which had rain most of the morning and intermittently most of the day up until the 5 p.m. post time.
This is almost certainly a large factor in this year’s attendance at 147k attendees, down from 156k last year, and markedly from the all-time record of 170k in 2015.
The ten-year drought in record-breaking attendance may be more generally due to Americans’ declining interest in the sport.
While more than 40 states now allow betting on horse racing, the overall handle, or total amount wagered, has fallen for the last three years.
While only slightly down more than 3% to $11.2 billion in handle last year, compare that with the more than 20% increase in sports betting overall across the country and the continuing increase in the number of states allowing betting on both horses and sports in general . However, as the most coveted jewel in the Triple Crown, the Derby itself still gets plenty of action.
Increase in Handle
This was the third straight year that the race saw increasing handle, with more than $473 million wagered during Derby week, almost $350 million on actual Derby Day, and nearly $234 million on the race itself.
Of course, those numbers don’t include the army of offshore grey market horse racing and sports betting sites that probably also saw tens, if not hundreds, of millions wagered on the race.
TwinSpire, Churchill Downs’ official online betting partner, saw more than $108 million bet on the race, as national and even international media coverage provided millions in free advertising and news coverage.
Viewership, Odds and Winners
While the weather was less than ideal, and the track could be best described as soupy, this year’s race was as always a heart stopper, with both favorite Journalism, and 7 to 1 underdog Sovereignty back as many as 13 lengths at one time, before both made a mad dash at the final turn to separate from the pack and dual down to the wire.
It might have been different in better conditions, but the best mud runner ruled the day, and Sovereignty won by a length at the finish in just over 2:02 minutes.
In an unfortunate but not at all uncommon move, horse trainer Bill Mott decided not to give the two horses another chance to compete against each other in the Preakness and concentrate instead on the upcoming Belmont Stakes, which will be run at Saratoga this year.
This immediately ends any talk of either a quick rematch or a 2025 Triple Crown Winner.
Overall viewership for the Derby hit an estimated 17 million. Without a rematch, the Preakness, which races only two weeks after the Derby, will be lucky to see a third of that.
But it’s this calendar of three grueling races only five weeks apart that often leads to some Derby winners just not being in top form a few short weeks later and deciding instead to rest until the June 7th running of the Belmont Stakes.
The fateful decision was not likely altered much by the $62,000 fine and two-day suspension of winning jockey Junior Alvarado.
He picked up his first win in a Triple Crown race at the detriment to his reputation for overuse of the whip coming down the straightaway.
Kentucky Derby rules allow for the whip to be used just six times, and Alvarado says in the heat of the moment and mud, he lost track and used it eight times.
I didn’t abuse the horse. Nobody can tell me, even if they can prove that I hit the horse two extra times, it was in an abusing way, it’s just ridiculous. The punishment doesn’t fit the crime and I don’t think there was any crime.” – Junior Alvarado, Winning Jockey, Daily Racing Form
While not overtly apologetic about the overuse of the crop, Alvarado has also stated that he might appeal. He didn’t feel he abused his mount, but this was his second offence in 120 days, having struck a horse seven times during the Cherokee Mile, which was also raced at Churchill Downs.
Abuse or not, any sense of cruelty with 17 million eyes watching is unlikely to be overturned on appeal, as the Horse Racing Safety and Integrity Authority (HISA) realizes the potential impact on the future of racing if its current standards for fair treatment aren’t upheld in the Sport’s premier race.
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