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Horse racing is one of the most ancient sports in human history. Visiting a horse race has been a beloved pastime all over the world for centuries, and the gambling aspect of it has greatly contributed to the sport’s popularity, generating over $115 billion a year globally. In this article, we explore in which countries people bet on horse racing the most!

USA

Some of the most elite competitions in the world are held in the US, including Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes, and Belmont Stakes.

The most common type of horse betting in the US is for a horse to win (finish first), to place (finish first or second) or to show (finish first, second or third), and betting is predominantly pari-mutuel, meaning that all the bets on a particular race are pooled and split among the winning bettors. Thus, bettors don’t know in advance how big their winnings will be, because this depends on the total number of bettors.

Australia

The Melbourne Cup, annual event held in Melbourne, known as “the race that stops a nation“, is the biggest horse racing event in Australia, the country in which the sport was officially established already in 1810. Some of the best Thoroughbred horses are bred here. Several bodies, including the Australian Racing Board, govern racing and betting in Australia. Betting options include both on and off course betting, with fixed odds as well as pari-mutuel.

United Kingdom

Horse racing has a long tradition in the UK. The two main kinds of races are Flat and National Hunt, bets are usually made through bookmakers giving fixed odds, either online or in stores, and the annual turnover amounted to around £4.5 billion last year. The most prestigious races include Epsom Derby, Royal Ascot, The Grand National and Cheltenham Festival.

Japan

Horse racing is extremely popular in Japan and is one of only four sports Japanese can legally bet on, in addition to powerboat races, motorbikes races and cycling. The Japan Cup and The Nakayama Grand Jump attract thousands of visitors every year.

With a horse racing betting turnover exceeding $22 billion in 2015, Japan is the country with most horse racing bets placed of all the countries on this list.

Hong Kong

Over the past years, Hong Kong has established itself as one of the world centres of elite horse racing. Here, betting on horse races is part of the culture. The Hong Kong Jockey Club, founded in 1884, holds monopoly over horse race betting in Hong Kong and is the largest taxpayer in the city. Last year it recorded a record turnover of £11.2 billion from horse betting.  

France

The world’s richest turf race, Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe is held annually in France, just outside Paris. France is a world leader in the sport, organizing over 2000 meeting annually, both gallop and trotting. Other major events include The Grand Prix de Printemps series of races and the Week-end International de l’Obstacle.

Over the years gambling has seen extraordinary changes in its image. Indeed, there are experts in this field of business whose interest is to make sure that the casino environment adheres to the principles of design psychology, optimizing the layout, colours, themes, sounds, decorations, Golden Nugget bonus code etc in other to motivate casino visitors to gamble more. Keep reading to find out how they do it.   

Two dominant approaches to casino design are quite opposite. The first one, called the gaming approach, was developed by Bill Friedman, himself a former gambling addict. Friedman advocated the use of bright lights, loud sound and aggressive red and orange colours, with a goal to make visitors excited and increase their adrenaline levels. He also argued that players should be isolated from everything that is not related to gambling, which is why casinos often remove clocks, windows and any other reminder of the outside world, or how much time has passed.

In line with this, the maze layout, or labyrinth, seeks to make it very difficult for customers to find the exit once they have entered the premises. Moreover, without a way to keep track of the time – no clocks and no windows – casinos would become sophisticated webs ensnaring their prey. It gave gambling an Alice in Wonderland kind of feel where you would meander through seemingly endless machines and tables and find something new and interesting as you move along. Mirrors placed everywhere enhance the maze effect.

On the other hand, Roger Thomas, a professional interior designer, reinvented modern casino by putting accent on relaxation and luxury. “I create rooms that I want to be in,” is his motto. His main goal is to make people feel comfortable, thus making them more likely to take risks and spend money.

His playground layout design moves away from a closed space with no light to a large room with a high ceiling, large windows and glamorous décor. Flowers, art and monumental sculptures are used as décor. The key concept is to merge the furnishings with the game that will take place in the designated location. Much like a child’s playground the gambling areas will be organised in small clusters giving gamblers the ability to immediately identify their desired gaming station. Because of the small clusters of gaming opportunities, there is plenty of room for customers to freely manoeuvre around the casino and it also gives some privacy to people that are already on the slot machines or at the tables. The playground concept suggests that the compact areas where customers have almost no elbow room is a bane rather than a boon. If casinos are meant to inspire individuals to become wealthy then they need to be perceived to be wealthy enough to make a gambler’s dream come true. High ceilings with large statues boasting the establishment’s luxury have become the switch from the maze layout to the playground.

This casino design emphasizes calming colours, such as blues and golds, and plenty of natural light. Wide open spaces, large widows, and lot of room for relaxation are the main traits of this approach.

There are also some universal rules of casino design: pleasant scents are used, casino must have a coherent theme and the use of soft, ambient music rather than loud music, because the latter can be distracting.

The NBA finals came to a close this year with a four-game sweep against the Cleveland Cavaliers. On Friday night the Golden State Warriors were unstoppable, winning game 4 with a whopping 108:85. It was a historic moment for basketball where we saw Kevin Durant lockdown King James and win the MVP award, and certainly a great excitement for the Betway Kenya users.

Kevin Durant finished the game with 10 assists, 12 rebounds, and 20 points. Durant showed consistency throughout all four games and was the talisman for the team. He is now two-time NBA champion and a two-time NBA Finals MVP.

Durant’s NBA Finals MVP was contested by none other than Stephen Curry who scored a spectacular 37 points most of which were 3 pointers. Curry enjoyed three great games while in game 3 of the Finals he displayed a performance short of his sharpshooting capabilities – scoring a meagre 11 points while playing for 39 minutes. It was game 3 that probably gave Kevin Durant the edge over Curry by carrying the team to victory – he did score 43 points in 43 minutes.

Game 4 fell short of a thriller since the Cavs were in need of a scorer. Lebron James has been breaking records and is the first player in NBA history to amass 30,000 points, 8,000 assists, and 8,000 rebounds. King James’ accolades and stats will cement his place amongst greats in the history of basketball. Unfortunately, the Cavaliers needed all it could get against a team that had multiple weapons and could conjure something out of nothing with the likes of Kevin Durant, Klay Thompson, Stephen Curry, and Draymond Green. Now, amongst all of King James’ records, he is the first player to be swept twice in the NBA Finals. This may be a sign to change things up a bit and leave. If the Cavaliers do not bolster their squad with some serious firepower, the James may be on his way out seeking a better team. We cannot be too hard on him if the rest of the roster is nowhere near good at this point. J.R. Smith practically gave away game 1 with a mental lapse right before the clock.

This is now the Golden State Warriors third NBA championship in the span of four years and will boast one of the greatest offensive threats the NBA has ever seen. Plagued with injuries throughout the season the Warriors still managed to win the championships. Game 4 really showed just how exhausted the players really were – and still get away with the win – with Stephen Curry describing the fourth quarter as the hardest quarter both ‘physically and mentally.’ Bearing in mind that NBA dynasties had serious individual talent: Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen being largely responsible for the Bulls championships, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Magic Johnson for the Lakers, the Kobe and Shaq duo for the Lakers as well. It is this Golden State Warriors team where we see unselfish team effort. It might set the standard for a new type of basketball in the near future.

Warriors coach and legend Steve Kerr stated that ‘Cleveland was not a good defensive team this year, I’m just stating a fact, they were 28th or 29th in the league defensively and it was not their strong suit.’