Author: admin

The most valuable steeplechase of its kind in Britain, the Cheltenham Gold Cup is, for many, the highlight not just of the Cheltenham Festival, but of the whole National Hunt season. The race is run over three miles and two-and-a-half miles, and 22 notoriously stiff fences, on the stamina-laden New Course at Prestbury Park and provides a thorough examination of the prowess of any staying steeplechaser.

For the connections to many such horses, to even be in the reckoning for race of the calibre of the Cheltenham Gold Cup is a privilege and actually winning it remains, as pioneering jockey Rachael Blackmore out it, an “impossible dream”. Spare a thought, then, for those horses that are beaten by narrow margins in the ‘Blue Riband’ event because, as connections of On His Own (beaten a short-head in 2014) and Santini (beaten a neck in 2019) will probably acknowledge, it must be an agonising experience.

Of course, neither On His Own nor Santini ever won the Cheltenham Gold Cup, but the horse that was beaten a short-head not once, but twice, did manage to add his name to the roll of honour at the fourth time of asking. The horse in question was The Fellow, trained in France by Francois Doumen and ridden on all four Gold Cup attempts by Adam Kondrat. In 1991, The Fellow was sent off at a relatively unfancied 28/1, but nonetheless came within a whisker of beating Garrison Savannah. The following season, he returned to the Cheltenham Festival off a win in the King George VI Chase at Kempton Park on Boxing Day, but was again beat a short-head, by Cool Ground.

Until fairly recently, the answer to that question would have been the traditional “four miler”, the National Hunt Challenge Cup, which until 2020 was run over 3 miles, 7 furlongs and 147 yards on the Old Course. However, following a contentious renewal in 2019, when only four of the 18 runners finished on the prevailing soft ground and three jockeys were suspended for riding “contrary to the horse’s welfare”, the British Horseracing Authority (BHA) reviewed the distance and eligibility criteria of the race. The suspensions were subsequently quashed, but the distance of the National Hunt Challenge Cup was shortened to 3 miles 5 furlongs and 201 yards from 2020 onwards.

Thus, the oldest race run at the Festival is the longest no more, with that distinction belonging to the Cross Country Chase, which was inaugurated in 2005 and has been sponsored since 2009 by Speyside whisky distillery Glenfarclas. As the title suggests, the race is the only one run on the Cross Country Course at Cheltenham during the Festival and is currently scheduled as the fourth race on the second day, dubbed ‘Style Wednesday’. The Glenfarclas Cross Country Chase is run over 3 miles, 6 furlongs and 37 yards – or, in other words, 56 yards further than the revised National Hunt Challenge Cup – and a total of 32 distinctive obstacles akin to those found in open countryside. Runners must negotiate banks, ditches, hedges and even a Grand National-style fence.