Heavy rain overnight softened the going for the main event of Day 4, boosting the chances of competitors who had opted for something more comfortable than four-inch stilettos.
A light southerly breeze also militated against loose-fitting hats. But despite the conditions, the race for the Best Dressed Person title was a thriller, as usual, with the result in doubt until the finishing line.
The Best Dressed Person contest is the highlight of Ladies' Day at Galway (or Persons' Day as it must surely be renamed soon).
But the coy title fools nobody. The best-dressed man is disposed of quietly with a €200 voucher, and the mortified winner is usually grateful for the indifference that greets him.
By contrast, the women's contest (first prize €3,000) culminates in a glare of publicity, and the competition among the hats alone makes the adjudication tent look like a cross between an aviary and a hothouse in the Botanical Gardens.
Like the races themselves, the clothes competitions are a graveyard for tipsters.
Nevertheless male members of the media put all their money yesterday on a Lithuanian entrant, Zivil Sabonaite, who was wearing a tight, lime-green, leather two-piece outfit, featuring a miniskirt and a lot of zips.
And they were wrong, as usual; with the adjudicators opting instead for an elegant, if demure, pink and lilac silk outfit from the Renate Nucci stable, worn by Mary Kelly from Tuam Road, Galway.
It was a local win, but one with a proven form-line, as it quickly emerged that Mary had won the top prize at Fairyhouse four years ago.
The key word about the winning ensemble was "versatile", according to Mary's best friend and fashion consultant, Maura Doyle, who confirmed that the outfit's connections were not worried by the morning rain: "You can wear it with anything - it looks great over jeans."
The media got one thing right yesterday. But only because the official Best Hat turned out to have a TG4 newsreader under it - Áine Lally from Spiddal.
The hat contained bits of animal (a feather from an unidentified bird), vegetable (chillies, representing the Galway GAA colours, or something close), and mineral (strips of film reel, in honour of TG4).
Responsibility for the design was claimed - probably in a coded telephone call to the TG4 newsroom - by Áine's friend and milliner Bridget Higgins. The prize was a weekend for two in Boston.
There was racing as well yesterday, although it went largely unnoticed in the Best Dressed Persons' tent.
Even so, Cloone River's success in the Galway Hurdle made it a hat-trick (or a hat, dress, and horse trick, to be more exact) for the home county.
The reception given to the winner suggested that everyone in the village of Gort had invested in the horse. And the fact that it was backed in from 12-1 to 7-2 favourite suggested that Gort was not alone.
The Thursday card - always the most popular of the week - attracted a whopping 37,437 people, who bet more than €5 million, a festival record.
The figure included €1 million on the Hurdle alone, the biggest collective gamble yet on an Irish horse-race.
Forty-four helicopters made 800 trips to and from the race-course during the afternoon, twice the number of flights handled in an average day at Dublin Airport, apparently.
The attendance did not include Bertie Ahern, however, whose holidays began officially yesterday.
Nor did it include Charlie McCreevy, who now appears to be a confirmed non-runner at this year's event.
The races enter wind-down mode today, with an evening meeting, although with three days of the festival yet to come, Galway City is still winding up.