The Stayers’ Hurdle is the highlight of the penultimate day of racing at the 2023 Cheltenham Festival. The Turners Novices’ Chase and the Ryanair Chase are the other two Grade 1 races of the day. In 2023, Cheltenham Thursday falls on 16th March, and 7 races will take place in total. Here’s our Cheltenham Thursday betting preview and tips for 2023:
Cheltenham Thursday betting – Grade 1 Races
13:30 Turners Novices’ Chase (Golden Miller Novices’ Chase)
Our Tip: Balco Coastal
- (Fences, 2 miles 4 furlongs)
- Novice chasers, at least 5 years old, take part.
- Ruby Walsh is the leading jockey in this race with 3 wins – Vantour in 2015, Black Hercules in 2016, and Yorkhill in 2017. Willie Mullins was the trainer of all these horses, as well as the 2012 winner Sir Des Champs – his 4 wins make him the leading trainer in this race.
- 2019 saw Defi du Seuil win (jockeyed by Barry Geraghty), 2020 saw Samcro win (jockeyed by Davy Russell), 2021 saw Chantry House win (jockeyed by Nico de Boinville), and 2022 saw Bob Olinger win (jockeyed by Rachael Blackmore).
14:50 Ryanair Chase (Festival Trophy)
Our Tip: Shishkin
- (Fences, 2 miles 5 furlongs)
- Horses aged 5 years or older take part.
- Ruby Walsh is the race’s leading jockey with 4 wins, including on the Willie Mullins trained pair Vantour in 2016 and Un De Sceaux in 2017. Willie Mullins is the leading trainer with 5 wins, as he was also successful in 2020 when Min won, and in both 2021 and 2022 when Allaho won.
15:30 STAYERS’ HURDLE – CHELTENHAM THURSDAY’S FEATURE RACE
Our Tip: Flooring Porter
- (Hurdles, 3 Miles)
- This is the leading National Hunt long-distance hurdles race of the season.
- The race is held on the New Course.
- Horses at least 4 years old can participate.
- The race became known as the Stayers’ Hurdle from 1972, but renamed the World Hurdle between 2005 and 2016. However, since 2017 it has reverted back to the Stayers’ Hurdle.
- Since 1972, only 1 horse has won at least four times – that’s Big Buck’s (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012). Infact, the jockey on each of those occasions was Ruby Walsh, who also won in 2017 on Nichols Canyon – his 5 wins make him the leading jockey since 1972.
- Paisley Park won in 2019, whilst Lisnagar Oscar won in 2020.
- Jockey Danny Mullins and trainer Gavin Cromwell enjoyed back to back wins with Flooring Porter – the winner in both 2021 and 2022.
Cheltenham Thursday betting – Non Grade 1 Races
14:10 Pertemps Network Final Handicap Hurdle
Our Tip: Thanksforthehelp
16:10 Plate Handicap Chase (Magners Plate Handicap Chase)
Our Tip: Datsalrightgino
16:50 Mares Novices’ Hurdle (Dawn Run Mares Novices’ Hurdle)
Our Tip: Luccia
17:30 Kim Muir Challenge Cup (Fulke Walwyn Kim Muir Challenge Cup)
Our Tip: Royal Thief
All tips above were published prior to the start of the first race in this article (and remain unchanged since then), but anything else in this article may have been updated afterwards.
