… theatres, balls, eating and drinking, to cock fighting or pugilism. Practices > Games & Sports Keywords Elite Gambling Horseracing Sports Women Horse racing had a prominent place amongst the new forms of human sociability and … wider social participation and much more geographic diversity, and the varied opportunities racing gave for sociability, gambling, and its complex inter-connections with political life. 3 Study of the thoroughbred racehorse, itself a key … of horse races which supposedly encouraged ‘idleness’, less socially worthy activities and absenteeism, the cheating and gambling racing could encourage, and other social, economic and military concerns, led to a draconian Act of 1740. 8 …