All-Weather Racing Guide: Tapeta vs Polytrack and the Draw at Every AW Track

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By The Guv'nor · Last updated October 2026

All-weather racing is Flat racing on a synthetic surface instead of grass, so it can go ahead when frost or rain stops turf racing. Britain has six all-weather tracks: Kempton, Lingfield and Chelmsford City race on Polytrack; Wolverhampton, Newcastle and Southwell race on Tapeta. Ireland has Dundalk. It runs all year, building to Finals Day on Good Friday.

Look, I'm essentially a statistics/maths geek, so I'd rather know how these tracks actually ride than repeat what the pub says about them. For this guide I went through every all-weather race at the seven tracks from 1 October 2025 to 30 September 2026: 3,139 races and 28,854 runners, with the draw, starting price and in-running comment for each horse. Sample sizes sit next to the percentages, and the method is at the bottom.

What all-weather racing is and when it runs

In Britain it's Flat racing only: every one of the 322 all-weather fixtures with a confirmed venue in the BHA's 2027 fixture list is a Flat fixture.

All-weather racing in Britain goes back to 1989, when Lingfield's first all-weather track was completed that October. Wolverhampton became Britain's first floodlit course in 1993, and floodlit evening cards are now a big part of the winter programme.

Racing runs every month, but the volume swings with the turf calendar.

Going forward, the BHA's 2027 fixture list has 334 Flat all-weather fixtures, down from 345 in 2026. Between 2018 and 2026 the yearly figure ranged from 332 to 351, so it's a steady programme. Twelve were still marked "venue TBC" on publication.

In Ireland, Horse Racing Ireland's 2027 list has 40 fixtures at Dundalk, 31 of them evening meetings.

The surfaces: Polytrack vs Tapeta (and Southwell's switch)

There are two surfaces in use in Britain and Ireland now. Polytrack is used at Lingfield, Kempton, Chelmsford City and Dundalk. Tapeta is used at Wolverhampton, Newcastle and Southwell, and is described as a blend of "fibres, waxes, PVC and sand to a depth of up to seven inches". The third surface, Fibresand, has gone: Southwell raced on it until summer 2021 and switched to Tapeta later that year.

So treat Southwell form from before late 2021 like form from another course. Every Southwell number on this page is from the Tapeta era.

Distances are in furlongs: a furlong is about 201 metres, so 8f is a mile (about 1,609 metres).

Tapeta vs Polytrack: what the data says

Here's the bit the brochures don't tell you. Put every race together by surface and both favour horses that race up with the pace, the Polytrack tracks slightly more so. Held-up horses win well under their fair share on both.

"Fair share" means the share of runners who raced that way: early leaders were 12.1% of runners but supplied 20.2% of winners. The gap between the surfaces is small, and it's mostly a Newcastle and Southwell thing: Wolverhampton is Tapeta too and rides as much in favour of pace as any Polytrack track. So I'd think track first, surface second.

Standard, standard to slow and what the going means

All-weather going uses its own words: Standard is the normal state, and Standard to Slow means the surface is riding slower than that. In practice, one description dominates each track. Kempton was Standard to Slow for 409 of its 416 races (the other seven had no going recorded), Newcastle for 53 of 524 and Lingfield for 10 of 453; every race at Chelmsford City, Wolverhampton, Southwell and Dundalk was Standard. So the description tells you more about the track than the day, and the Newcastle and Lingfield samples are too small to compare the two goings fairly. For how going works on turf, see horse racing going explained.

Track by track: Kempton, Lingfield, Chelmsford, Wolverhampton, Newcastle, Southwell and Dundalk

First, each track side by side (the turf courses are in my UK and Irish racecourses guide). The favourite is the bookmakers' SP favourite (joint favourites count as a win if either won). My full favourites study, using Betfair SP across all UK and Irish racing, is on how often do favourites win.

Kempton

Kempton is the only right-handed all-weather track in Britain or Ireland. The Polytrack is a floodlit oval of 10 furlongs using the outer bend or 8 furlongs using the inner, and the home straight is 20 metres wide with a false rail at the two-furlong pole. It was built in 2005-06, when the course closed for eleven months, and has been refurbished in 2015, 2016 and 2018. The turf here is jumps only now, which is where the King George VI Chase is run on Boxing Day.

In my data it was the track where the draw showed up most clearly. Across all trips, high-drawn horses won 27.7% of the 325 races with eight or more runners, against roughly 36% if the draw made no difference. Low-drawn horses did best at 6f (42.4% of 66 races) and the middle third at 7f (48.2% of 83 races), while the mile showed nothing at all.

Lingfield

Lingfield's all-weather loop runs inside the turf course: left-handed, 1m2f round, rising slightly to the back straight and then downhill round the bottom turn. The 5f, 6f, 7f and 1m starts are all downhill, which is why it's described as the sharpest of the all-weather tracks. It had the highest share of winners that led early: 24.3% of the winners in its 453 races, from 12.9% of the runners, and the SP favourite won 38.9%. The draw, on the other hand, was close to an even split at every trip.

Chelmsford City

Chelmsford City is an 8-furlong left-handed Polytrack oval with big sweeping bends and a 2-furlong straight. It opened as Great Leighs in 2008, didn't race from 2009 to 2014, and reopened as Chelmsford City in January 2015. In 2026 it stopped racing again (the BHA moved two of its October 2026 fixtures to Southwell), and Arena Racing Company has since taken over. The racecourse says racing returns from Monday 2 November 2026. So my Chelmsford sample is the smallest here: 178 races, all between 2 October 2025 and 26 March 2026. Low draws won 42.5% of the 106 races with eight or more runners, against about 30% expected, which is the strongest draw figure in the data. I'd want to see it hold up once racing returns.

Wolverhampton

Wolverhampton is Britain's busiest all-weather track (84 of 334 fixtures in 2027). It's a tight, left-handed Tapeta oval of just over a mile with chutes for 6f and 7f races and a short run-in. It's a pace track: early leaders supplied 22.9% of winners from 12.6% of the runners, and held-up horses only 17.5% from 34.9% of the runners, the worst return for hold-up horses at any of the seven. Low draws did well over 5f (43.9% of 57 races), but the other trips were close to an even split.

Newcastle

Newcastle's Tapeta opened in May 2016 and replaced the old turf Flat course, while jumps racing carries on over turf. It's described as wide and galloping, and its straight mile is the only one on an all-weather track in Britain. Along with Southwell it was the fairest track for hold-up horses: they supplied 25.1% of the winners in 524 races from 34.5% of the runners, still below their share, but well ahead of Wolverhampton or Lingfield. The draw showed no clear pattern.

Southwell

Southwell's Tapeta oval is left-handed and a mile and a quarter round, with tight, slightly cambered bends, a 3f run-in and a 2f spur that allows straight 5f races. In my data it was the least front-runner friendly track in Britain: early leaders supplied 15.7% of the winners in 537 races from 12.1% of the runners, and held-up horses 25.3%. Low draws won only 19.0% of 79 races over 6f, just short of significance, so call it a lean.

Dundalk

Dundalk is Ireland's all-weather course: a floodlit, left-handed Polytrack oval of a mile and a quarter, opened in August 2007. It had the biggest average fields of the seven tracks in my data (11.4 runners), and horses that led or raced prominently supplied 64.3% of the winners in its 323 races from 44.5% of the runners. The draw was close to an even split. For what's coming up across Irish racing, see my Irish racing tips page.

Draw and running style on each track

Here's the honest answer first. Over one season, running style mattered far more than the draw at almost every track.

Running style

I put every runner into one of four groups from the first position in its in-running comment: led (including "made all"), prominent (tracked or chased the leaders), midfield, or held up. Then I compared each group's share of winners with its share of runners.

Every track favoured horses racing up with the pace, and none was kind to hold-up horses. Lingfield, Wolverhampton and Kempton gave early leaders close to double their fair share of wins. Newcastle and Southwell gave the best chance (still below par) to horses held up, and, along with Chelmsford City, the smallest edge to horses that led or raced prominently. The catch is that you only know who led after the race. Before it, you're guessing from a horse's past comments and the shape of the field, and I'd assume the market knows the obvious front-runners too.

The draw

For the draw I used races with eight or more runners and split each field into thirds by stall position after non-runners were taken out: low, middle and high. With no bias at all, the low third would win about 30% of races, the middle about 34% and the high third about 36% (not an exact third each, because of how odd-sized fields split). The table shows each track overall, plus every trip with at least 50 qualifying races.

Only five of the 25 rows clear the significance line: Kempton overall, Kempton 6f and 7f, Chelmsford City overall and Wolverhampton 5f. Testing that many rows, you'd expect one or two to clear it by luck. So the honest reading is that the Kempton all-weather draw bias looks real (it holds up for placed horses too), Chelmsford and Wolverhampton 5f are worth watching, and Lingfield, Newcastle, Southwell and Dundalk showed nothing you could lean on.

If you want the draw at turf courses, where it can matter a lot more, my draw bias guide covers every UK and Irish Flat course, and the members-only Draw Biases In Flat Racing special goes further.

How form transfers between surfaces

Does Polytrack form carry over to Tapeta, and the other way round? I followed every horse from one all-weather run to its next within the season and compared horses that stayed on the same surface with horses that switched. The last column, A/E, is actual winners divided by the winners their starting prices implied: 1.00 means they won exactly as often as the market expected.

Switching surface didn't hurt. Last-time-out winners who switched won 23.3% of the time (645 runs, range 20.2% to 26.7%), against 20.0% for those who stayed put (1,664 runs). Winners going from Polytrack to Tapeta did best of all, 27.0% from 311 runs with an A/E of 1.29, while Tapeta to Polytrack winners scored 19.8% from 334 runs (A/E 1.01). That's hindsight on one season, so I wouldn't build a system on it, but there's no sign here that a change of surface should put you off a horse.

For reading the rest of a horse's form, see my guide on how to read horse racing form.

The All-Weather Championships and Finals Day

The All-Weather Championships were created by Arena Racing Company in 2013, and 2026/27 is the 14th season. The 2026/27 season starts at Newcastle on Tuesday 20 October 2026 and ends on Good Friday, 26 March 2027, when Newcastle stages Finals Day and Lingfield stages the All-Weather Vase card on the same afternoon. Newcastle says it first staged Finals Day in 2022, taking over from Lingfield.

• Six categories: 3-Year-Old, Sprint, Mile, Middle Distance, Marathon, and Fillies & Mares.
• Prize money: over £1 million on Finals Day, with the six finals run alongside the Listed Burradon Stakes.
• How to qualify: at least three all-weather runs in Britain, Ireland, France or America (or two there plus one on the dirt in Dubai or Saudi Arabia) between 20 October 2026 and 20 March 2027, and an official BHA rating high enough to make the cut.
• Trials Days: Lingfield on 2 January 2027 and Newcastle on 13 February 2027. A Trial winner gets a free entry to the matching Final.

The rules are on the All-Weather Championships site. In 2026 it was run on 3 April. For when the turf takes over again, see when the Flat season starts.

How I approach all-weather racing

If I am honest, the tables above are the easy bit. Whatever the surface, I'm looking at prices and probabilities, not at whether something "should" win, and I care about profit month to month, not a high strike rate. Anyone can talk about high win rates when they tip odds-on horses all day.

My daily newsletter usually has 'Banker' bets, which is what I call the shorter-priced, more solid picks, and then outsiders from my system that picks out horses that have won or come close off a higher weight or mark than they're running off today. I like outsiders and each-way value, because even when they place we make more profit than an odds-on shot winning.

The numbers above are a good reminder to keep your head. The pace edge is real but it's not a free lunch, the draw edges mostly aren't there, and losers are a thing. Stake in points (1pt might be £5 on a £100 bank), don't chase, and if you're unsure about a bet, skip it. Some days there's nothing worth backing, and that's fine too: a stinky day for the ponies is better than a forced bet.

How I built these numbers

Source: official results as published on Sporting Life's results pages (draw, position, starting price, going and in-running comment for each runner) for every all-weather race at the seven tracks. Turf races were left out using the surface recorded on each result.

Period and sample: 1 October 2025 to 30 September 2026, one season. 3,139 races and 28,854 runners; non-runners and withdrawn horses excluded. As a check against Betfair's BSP files, the race counts at Wolverhampton (708), Chelmsford City (178) and Dundalk (323) matched exactly, and 1,207 of the 1,213 winners matched by name.

Running style is my classification of each comment's first position phrase, so it's a judgement, not an official figure; 279 runners had no usable comment and are left out of the pace numbers. Draw thirds use stall order among the actual runners. Running-style percentages are shares of the winners and runners whose comment could be classified. Ranges in brackets are 95% confidence intervals. A/E uses starting prices scaled so each race's chances add up to 100%.

One season is a small sample for splits like these. I'll add each new season every October; until then, treat anything with a few dozen races as a lean, not a law.

All-weather racing FAQs

Which UK racecourses are all-weather?

Six: Kempton, Lingfield and Chelmsford City (Polytrack), and Wolverhampton, Newcastle and Southwell (Tapeta). Lingfield, Kempton, Newcastle and Southwell also have turf courses. Dundalk is the all-weather track in Ireland.

What is the difference between Tapeta and Polytrack?

Both are synthetic; Tapeta is a blend of fibres, waxes, PVC and sand. In my 2025/26 data, pace was slightly more of an advantage on Polytrack, mainly because Newcastle and Southwell (both Tapeta) were the kindest tracks to hold-up horses.

Is there a draw bias at Kempton on the all-weather?

In my 2025/26 data, a modest one: high draws won 27.7% of 325 races with eight or more runners, against about 36% expected, with low draws best over 6f and no bias over a mile. It's one season, so treat it as a lean.

What does standard to slow mean in horse racing?

It's an all-weather going description meaning the surface is riding slower than normal (Standard). At Kempton it was the description for 409 of the 416 all-weather races in my 2025/26 data (the other seven had no going recorded), so it's the normal state there.

When is All-Weather Finals Day 2027?

Good Friday, 26 March 2027, at Newcastle, with the All-Weather Vase at Lingfield on the same day.

More in this guide

• UK and Irish racecourses: every track by direction, shape and surface
• Draw bias at every UK and Irish Flat course
• Chester draw bias, 5f to 1m
• How often favourites win, by course and race type
• How to pick a winner