FanDuel Becomes First U.S, Sportsbook To Combine Horse Racing Wagering With Sports Betting

FanDuel Making History

On Dec. 21, FanDuel announced that its customers can now access both parimutuel horse race wagering and traditional sports wagering from a single account on FanDuel, becoming the first sportsbook operator to offer both under a single account.

Prior to this feature, FanDuel customers were required to open a separate account (FanDuel Racing) with a separate wallet from their sportsbook account, if they wanted to participate in parimutuel horse race wagering. The merging feature is now available to FanDuel users in New York, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, West Virginia, Wyoming, Michigan, Colorado, and Virginia. FanDuel does have plans to expand the feature to additional states in the new year, though no definitive timeline has been determined.

Flutter Entertainment, which owns FanDuel, has a large customer demographic of horse racing fans across its United Kingdom and Australian platforms, so it’s not surprising to see FanDuel increasing its focus on it.

“Horse racing is a big part of our DNA” said CEO of FanDuel, Amy Howe. “This is a significant opportunity to expose a broader, engaged audience to the sport in a familiar environment.”

FanDuelTV Grows

Users in New York, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, West Virginia, Wyoming, Michigan, Colorado, and Virginia, will also be able to stream horse racing coverage on the newly-launched FanDuel TV.

FanDuel TV was launched in September 2022 as a rebranding of its TVG network. The platform is a broadly distributed linear cable network that offers live sports and complementary sports programming alongside FanDuel’s standard offerings.

FanDuel TV is focused almost exclusively on horse racing coverage (though there are other product offerings) backed by a long list of experts that contribute to the platform’s shows. Some notable names are: Christina Blacker, Britney Eurton, Gabby Gaudet, Mike Joyce, and Todd Schrupp. 

“TVG has been the undisputed leader in the horse racing space for the past 20 years and the launch of FanDuel TV creates an exciting new platform for the next 20 years,” said CCO of FanDuel, Mike Raffensperger in the initial press release. “FanDuel TV and FanDuel+ will accelerate the renaissance racing is enjoying and repackage the sport for a new generation of mobile enabled fans, while also bringing new leagues and sports to the U.S. market.  We plan to offer more live sports than any network in America.”

DraftKings Joins The Ring

FanDuel’s announcement comes roughly one month after DraftKings announced the launch of its very own horse racing app. Churchill Downs established a partnership with DraftKings that added horse race wagering to its online portfolio via DK Horse. While it has not been launched, the app is expected to be released prior to the Kentucky Derby in May 2023 in 21 different states.

Supposedly, users will be able to use one account across DK Horse and other DraftKings apps in the future, but when it initially launches, users will have to deposit funds in a separate account. While their idea to merge the account may have seemed novel at the time, they will fall in line behind FanDuel when/if they do launch the feature.