Champion Hurdle Betting

Champion Hurdle betting provides punters with nearly four minutes of exhilaration as the very best hurdlers in Europe go to battle over eight hurdles spread over a distance of just over two miles at Prestbury Park. The Champion Hurdle is the highlight of the inaugural day of the legendary Cheltenham Festival held in mid March each year. It is also the third leg of the WBX Hurdling Triple Crown, linking it with the Fighting Fifth at Newcastle and the Christmas Hurdle at Kempton. Any horse managing to win all three races in the same season will receive a bonus of one million pounds. Offered since 2007, the bonus has yet to be won.

The Champion Hurdle was first run in 1927 and has only been lost on the racing calendar four times since its inception. In 1931 persistent frost was the culprit, in 1943 and 1944 World War II intervened and in 2001 the foot and mouth crisis led to the meeting being cancelled.

Blaris, the Bill Payne trained six year old gelding, was the victor in 1927. He received just £365. Today the winner will receive in excess of £200,000 with prize money being offered down to sixth place. For punters, the race has provided both a plethora of financially rewarding favourites and significant success on the occasional outsider in the Champion Hurdle betting.

JP McManus' Istabraq was the most prolific recent winner of the Champion Hurdle - and repeatedly rewarded favourite followers in the Champion Hurdle betting. The Aidan O'Brien trained gelding first succeeded in 1998 as a six year old, under Charlie Swan, having been sent off the 3-1 favourite in the betting. His followers had very little cause for anxiety after he raced prominently throughout, leading by the third last and quickening easily to win by twelve lengths from another Aidan O'Brien runner, Theatreworld, a 20-1 shot in the Champion Hurdle betting.

History repeated itself a year later in 1999 when Istabraq, 4-9 favourite in the Champion Hurdle betting, once again triumphed ridden by Charlie Swan over John Magnier's Theatreworld by three and a half lengths (by now they were both seven year olds) who started at odds of 16-1. Once again, Istabraq was close up throughout and led by the second last giving his followers a reassuring race from start to finish.

By 2000, the punters were fairly sure who would be the Champion Hurdle winner and the eight year old Istabraq started the 8-15 favourite in the betting. Once again, favourite backers were rewarded as he cruised home under Charlie Swan, beating Francois Doumen's five year old 11-1 shot, Hors La Loi III, by four lengths. Theatreworld was once again among those taking part but, in 2000, could only finish ninth in the twelve runner contest.

The 2001 running of the Champion Hurdle was cancelled, along with the entire Cheltenham Festival and most other meetings, following the disastrous outbreak of foot and mouth disease in England. Istabraq was still in devastating form, clocking up a number of wins in Ireland that year. Had the race gone ahead, he would undoubtedly have started the favourite. In the early months of 2001 he was odds on favourite in the ante post Champion Hurdle betting. Circumstances beyond everyone's control dictated that his next and final run in the Champion Hurdle was to be postponed for a year. In 2002 it ended abruptly as he pulled up in the early stages and immediately retired from racing.

So what should punters be looking for to achieve success in the Champion Hurdle betting?

Looking back at the list of the past winners of the race, there are some key statistics that are worth bearing in mind before you place your Champion Hurdle bet.

The race is open to four year olds and over. Results in recent years make a compelling argument for avoiding both the four years olds and the five year olds. You will have to track all the way back to 1942 to find a four year old winner, Vic Smyth's Forestation.

In nearly one hundred attempts, only one five year old has succeeded lately, the diminutive but precocious Katchit, trained by Alan King. He was sent off at 10-1 in the betting when he achieved a win in the 2008 Champion Hurdle as a five year old. That was the first five year old success since Nicky Henderson's prolific Champion Hurdle winner, See You Then, in 1985.

See You Then was the Istabraq of the eighties, achieving three consecutive Champion Hurdle wins at ever shortening odds in the betting. Astonishingly, he was put in the race yet again as a ten year old in 1990, just a few weeks after falling at Wincanton. He started at 25-1 in the Champion Hurdle betting and finished last. Older horses have a poor record in the Champion Hurdle. Only two horses over nine years old have succeeded in the entire history of the race. Peter Easterby's Sea Pigeon managed to win as a ten year old and then as an eleven year old in 1981, exactly thirty years after Vincent O'Brien's Hatton's Grace (a triple Champion Hurdle winner) achieved exactly the same feat.

So it is definitely worth considering the age of the horses in the Champion Hurdle betting. Six year olds have the best results in the past twenty years followed by seven and eight year olds. If you are betting to win, you can probably discount any horse aged nine or over as only Phillip Hobbs' Rooster Booster and James Fanshawe's Royal Gait have claimed the top spot since the distant days of Sea Pigeon.

Taking a quick look at trainers, Nicky Henderson is one to look out for when betting on the Champion Hurdle. Like with the Cheltenham Gold Cup betting and Grand National betting, very few current trainers have succeeded with more than one horse in the race - Henderson has won with three. Only Peter Easterby shares that achievement. Not only did Henderson succeed three times with See You Then but, in the 2009 Champion Hurdle, he managed to get not only the winner, 22-1 shot in the betting, Punjabi, but third place too with Binocular, the rather disappointing 6-4 favourite. Binocular finally fulfilled his promise in the Champion Hurdle by winning at odds of 9-1 in 2010. Henderson also trained the third horse that year, Zaynar, sent off at 15-2. The 11-4 favourite in the Champion Hurdle betting, Noel Meade's Go Native, was burdened by heavy ante post support and finished third last, clearly far from his best. Admittedly Henderson tends to have a high number of entries in the race but his recent success rate cannot be ignored.

Your selection in the Champion Hurdle betting needs good recent form too. Over eighty percent of the past twenty five winners won their previous race. As with most races at Cheltenham, good previous form on the track is a major positive indicator for punters.

Looking at the past results, a 10 year old 100-1 shot in the Champion Hurdle betting with poor recent form is unlikely to make you a profit but favourites do get beaten - especially by six to eight year olds who won last time out.

Champion Hurdle 2011

The 2011 running belonged firmly to the favourite in the Champion Hurdle betting, Hurricane Fly. Read the full story of the race: Champion Hurdle 2011 Result & Review

Champion Hurdle 2010

Binocular was the horse that had been taken out of The Champion Hurdle Betting, yet he won the race.

The 2010 Cheltenham Champion Hurdle victor had all but been retired for the season with a muscle strain before trainer Nicky Henderson gave his star hurdler the all-clear to run and certainly the hurdler had seemed unexpectedly lacklustre on several occasions.

As with all u-turns that appear to hoodwink punters, there were a fair few conspiracy theories, or people talking through their pockets. It is always frustrating when a horse that had been ruled out of race then romps home. But there were more winners than losers. After all, this is the horse that had been ante-post betting favourite for The Champion Hurdle during the 'closed season', over the previous summer. Many grateful Champion Hurdle punters will have been recovering their betting slips from the waste paper basket and these early birds will have had a nice financial pick-up.

Come the day, that was all history as Binocular made a piece of history. He went from the one horse nobody had wanted to creating a one-horse race, such was the ease of his dominance over distant runner-up, Khyber Kim.