A RECORD crowd at Newton Abbot Racecourse this weekend has prompted organisers to look at improvements after racegoers experience lengthy delays.

The ‘once in an era’ attendance at Saturday’s race meeting saw a bumper crowd of 8,053.

But the massive turnout put pressure on facilities at the popular course with long queues for bars, food outlets and toilets.

Some racegoers even struggled to get to the bookmakers to place a bet.

Following complaints, course managers apologised for the impact.

In a statement, the course said the figures were way above the largest crowd last year which was 6,000.

‘Saturday was our largest attendance this century.

‘We fully recognise that the scale of attendance, particularly the significantly high number of walk-up racegoers, presented operational challenges at times.

‘Despite increasing the number of bars, catering outlets and facilities, demand exceeded expectations and resulted in longer queues than we would have liked in certain areas.

‘We understand that this impacted the experience for some and for that we sincerely apologise.

‘Our team worked extremely hard under considerable pressure throughout the day and we are grateful for the patience and support shown by so many.

‘While this was an exceptional, once in an era level of attendance, we are not complacent.

‘We have taken on board the feedback received and we are already identifying improvements to ensure we continue to enhance the Raceday experience across all fixtures.’

Racegoers criticised the queues for every facility and one said they had only been able to watch one race.

Some chose to leave before the end of the meeting to avoid delays leaving the course.

One said: ‘I’ve been going for 45 years and the crowd was one of the biggest ever.

‘They did try putting on more outdoor outlets but 45 minutes queuing is no fun.’

Others complained about queueing half an hour for drinks while there were also difficulties with access to toilets.