to be small, it often has the third-highest average attendance of any jumps track in Britain after Aintree and Cheltenham – the largest crowds can be just over 20,000 on one day.

Cartmel Racecourse is about 1-mile (1.6 km) round, with six fences, and is noted as having a four-furlong (804 metre) run-in on the Steeplechase course, the longest in Britain.

Until World War II it was a very small course featuring primarily amateur jockeys, but in the second half of the 20th century the racing programme was expanded and professionalised.

Cartmel Racecourse and its surrounding land have long been owned by the Holker Estate, where the Cavendish family still reside.

Hugh Cavendish became a Director on the Board of Cartmel Racecourse in 1974 and in 1998, bought out the management team to develop it further under the guidance of his allies at Aintree.

[2] Cartmel was the site of the Gay Future 'coup' in 1974 that involved switching horses before a race and relying on the lack of communications at the course.