How to Visit Newmarket’s National Horse Racing Museum

If you are a racing enthusiast, you will enjoy a visit to Newmarket’s award-winning National Horse Racing Museum. Racing novices will come away enlightened and entertained. The museum offers some interesting insights into Newmarket’s color past and racing history.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

1. Take a train to Newmarket from Ipswich or Cambridge. From the train station, you only have to walk for a few minutes to the National Horse Racing Museum in New Market High Street.
2. Drive to the city center and park near the Museum, if you come by car. You can also come by bus to Newmarket from London Victoria, Stansted, Cambridge and Great Yarmouth.
3. Visit during the Museum’s opening hours, between 11 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. The Museum is open throughout the week.
4. Buy an admission ticket and go in to see the Museum’s permanent collection and any temporary exhibition they might have on.
5. Learn about Newmarket’s royal connection, the various colorful characters of the racing industry and famous racing scandals.
6. View the head of Persimmon, who won the Royal Derby in 1876, and the skeleton of Eclipse, the ancestor of practically all the present-day thoroughbreds.
7. Admire James Lynwood-Palmer’s oil painting of Gainsborough, the winner of the Triple Crown in 1918; his win made his owner, Lady James Douglas, the first woman to win the Derby in her own colors. Look at the other Triple Crown winners: Sun Chariot (1942), Bahram (1933), Meld (1955), Nijinsky (1970) and Oh So Sharp (1985).
8. See the display on Fred Archer, a late Victorian jockey who committed suicide; they even have the suicide pistol on view. See items belonging to modern day champion jockeys like Lester Piggott and Frank Dettori.
9. Visit the "Practical Gallery" and have a go at tacking up their model horse. Dress up in jockey silks, get weighed out and experience riding a race on the horse simulator.
10. Browse through the Museum Gift Shop and its collection of art prints and bronze sculptures.
11. Conclude your visit with tea in the garden of the Museum Cafe.
12. Stay on in Newmarket and go on the various special tours organized by the Museum. Learn Newmarket’s history and get information on racing and race courses. You will visit stud farms and working stables, see racing horses close-up and talk to the people who work with them.

Tips & Warnings

• Book in advance for the special tours.
• Take membership to the "Friends of the Museum". This entitles you to free admission to the museum, discounted cafe rates, invitations to Private Views and annual special events.