2024 Cheltenham Festival: Five leading trainers

Willie Mullins

• Festival wins: 94
• Leading trainer: 10 times – 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023
• Best year: 2022 (10 wins)
• First Festival winner: Tourist Attraction, 1995 Supreme Novices’ Hurdle
• Champion Hurdle winners: Hurricane Fly (2011, 2013), Faugheen (2015), Annie Power (2016)
• Gold Cup winners: Al Boum Photo (2019, 2020), Galopin des Champs (2023)

If Willie Mullins can match last year’s feat of sending out six winners at the Cheltenham Festival again then he’ll reach a career total of 100, a milestone he’s odds-on to achieve this year. He was the leading trainer at the Festival for the tenth time in 2023 and for the fifth year running, a year after his record total of ten winners. A clean sweep of the eight Grade 1 contests at this year’s Dublin Racing Festival is a clear sign that the stable’s Cheltenham team will be at least as strong as in previous years.

Galopin des Champs heads that team after winning his second Irish Gold Cup at Leopardstown and is odds on to retain his Cheltenham Gold Cup crown too. But the banker for many will be another DRF winner, El Fabiolo, bidding to follow up his win in last year’s Sporting Life Arkle. There will be few better horses going to the Festival than State Man and, after winning the Irish equivalent again, he has been presented with a first-rate chance of going one better than in last year's Champion Hurdle in the absence of Constitution Hill. The same race could now be a more tempting option for Lossiemouth too but last year’s Triumph Hurdle winner would be another of the stable’s best chances of Grade 1 success in the Mares’ Hurdle, while Dinoblue, runner-up to El Fabiolo at Leopardstown, has good claims in the Mares’ Chase.

The usual strong band of novice hurdlers from Closutton is led by Ballyburn who, along with Tullyhill and Mystical Power (a son of the stable’s Champion Hurdle winner Annie Power), dominate the Supreme betting, while another DRF winner Dancing City, along with Readin Tommy Wrong and High Class Hero form a trio at the head of the Albert Bartlett market. Mullins will doubtless be well represented too in the Triumph Hurdle and Champion Bumper, including with the impressive Punchestown winner Maughreen in the latter contest, while the unbeaten Jade de Grugy is a leading contender for the Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle. Last season’s Champion Bumper runner-up Fact To File goes to the Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase with plenty of stable confidence, while Embassy Gardens is a firm favourite for the National Hunt Chase.

Gordon Elliott

• Festival wins: 37
• Leading trainer: twice - 2017, 2018
• Best year: 2018 (8 wins)
• First Festival winner: Chicago Grey, 2011 National Hunt Chase
• Gold Cup winner: Don Cossack (2016)

Gordon Elliott is the only trainer to have interrupted Mullins’ domination of the Festival in the last decade or so, doing so in both 2017 and 2018, and in the latter season notching eight winners which equalled what was then Mullins’ record total. There was a mix of youth and experience among his three winners last year, with Jazzy Matty winning the Boodles for four-year-olds alongside senior pair Sire du Berlais in the Stayers’ Hurdle and Delta Work in the Cross Country Chase. Those last two races could provide Elliott with some of his best chances of the week again. Besides the hat-trick-seeking Delta Work, Gigginstown have the high-class duo Coko Beach and Conflated in the reckoning for the Cross Country, though the latter has Ryanair Chase and Gold Cup (in which he was third last year) entries too, while they’re backed up by last year’s runner-up Galvin.

While Sire du Berlais could defend his Stayers’ title too, the stable has more appealing younger contenders in the Robcour pair Teahupoo, third last year on ground barely soft enough for him, and Leopardstown’s Christmas Hurdle winner Irish Point who are disputing favouritism in the ante-post lists. The latter could switch to the Champion Hurdle given very soft ground, especially now that Constitution Hill is an absentee. The same owner’s Gerri Colombe, touched off in last year’s Brown Advisory, is a Gold Cup contender although a long way behind Galopin des Champs last time.

The Champion Bumper is another race where Elliott has more than one leading hope, with big-money purchases Jalon d’Oudairies and Romeo Coolio capable of ensuring Mullins doesn’t have things all his own way. Losing Caldwell Potter from his Cheltenham team after his sale to Paul Nicholls was undoubtedly a blow but Elliott has that one’s unbeaten and highly regarded half-sister Brighterdaysahead in line for the Mares’ Novices’ Hurdle. Elliott is sure to be well represented in the handicaps as usual and he has won at least one such race at each of the last seven Cheltenham Festivals where he’s had runners.

Nicky Henderson

• Festival wins: 73
• Leading trainer: 9 times - 1985, 1986, 1987*, 1990, 1992*, 1993*, 2000, 2010, 2012 (*jointly)
• Best year: 2012 (7 wins)
• First Festival winner: See You Then, 1985 Champion Hurdle
• Champion Hurdle winners: See You Then (1985-1987), Punjabi (2009), Binocular (2010), Buveur d'Air (2017, 2018), Epatante (2020), Constitution Hill (2023)
• Gold Cup winners: Long Run (2011), Bobs Worth (2013)

Until Willie Mullins overtook him, Nicky Henderson was previously the Festival’s all-time leading trainer and a career total of 73 winners still makes him much the most successful British trainer at the meeting. While Henderson was leading trainer at the Festival most recently in 2012 (for the ninth time, either outright or jointly) when sending out seven winners, he went close again in 2019 when four was enough to match Mullins’ total that year but lost out by virtue of fewer placed horses. Henderson’s sole winner last year was Constitution Hill so it's a major blow that he won't be able to defend his Champion Hurdle title - he'd been odds on to give his trainer a tenth win in the race - after a respiratory infection was found to be the cause of a disappointing gallop at Kempton recently.

But Henderson has also trained more Triumph Hurdle winners than anyone else and has a very good chance of bagging another with the unbeaten Sir Gino who is now his yard’s best chance of a Festival winner this year. Constitution Hill is one of the few horses to have beaten Jonbon, doing so in the 2022 Supreme, but the latter has found a new nemesis over fences as he’s due to meet El Fabiolo again in the Queen Mother Champion Chase in what has the makings of a repeat of last year’s Sporting Life Arkle.

Shishkin has won both a Supreme and an Arkle in his time and has been a beaten favourite in the Champion Chase and Ryanair at the last two Festivals but he’s one of the leading British-trained hopes for the Gold Cup this time despite a season of mixed fortunes. The latest crop of novice hurdlers at Seven Barrows includes Jeriko du Reponet and Shanagh Bob who will take unbeaten records to the Supreme and Albert Bartlett respectively.

Paul Nicholls

• Festival wins: 48
• Leading trainer: 6 times - 1999, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009
• Best year: 2009 (5 wins)
• First Festival winner: Flagship Uberalles, 1999 Arkle Trophy
• Champion Hurdle winner: Rock On Ruby (2012)
• Gold Cup winners: See More Business (1999), Kauto Star (2007, 2009), Denman (2008)

While Paul Nicholls was champion trainer in Britain for a fourteenth time last season, it’s been a while since he was as dominant at the Festival, with 2009 being the last time he was leading trainer there. That was his sixth Cheltenham title in the same year that Kauto Star won his second Gold Cup. But after a couple of blank years following Politologue’s Queen Mother Champion Chase in 2020, Nicholls was back in the Cheltenham winner’s enclosure on two occasions last March after wins for Stage Star in the Turners Novices’ Chase and Stay Away Fay in the Albert Bartlett Novices’ Hurdle.

The same pair are among the yard’s leading hopes again this time around, with Stage Star prominent in the Ryanair Chase betting following another Cheltenham win since under a big weight and another positive ride from Harry Cobden in the Paddy Power Gold Cup. Stay Away Fay has taken well to fences and will have good claims in the Brown Advisory Novices’ Chase. Gold Cup runner-up Bravemansgame will be another from last year’s team back again though will be at longer odds this time taking on Galopin des Champs again.

Nicholls also has contenders again for both races he won at last year’s Festival. Turners hope Ginny’s Destiny has run up a hat-trick at Cheltenham this season and like Stage Star last year he goes to the Festival after carrying 12-0 to victory in the Timeform Novices’ Handicap on Trials Day but from a 5 lb higher mark. Bravemansgame and Stage Star were former Challow Hurdle winners and the stable’s latest winner of that contest Captain Teague looks the type who’ll appreciate the step up to three miles for the Albert Bartlett. With impressive Exeter winner Teeshan, Nicholls also has a Champion Bumper contender capable of making life difficult for the Irish in that contest.

Henry de Bromhead

• Festival wins: 21
• Best year: 2021 (6 wins)
• First Festival winner: Sizing Europe, 2010 Arkle Trophy
• Champion Hurdle winner: Honeysuckle (2021, 2022)
• Gold Cup winners: Minella Indo (2021), A Plus Tard (2022)

With dual Champion Hurdle winner Honeysuckle running her final race when winning her second Mares’ Hurdle at Cheltenham last year, and the more recent retirement of his 2022 Gold Cup winner A Plus Tard, Henry de Bromhead will be without a couple of the horses that have provided him with some of his greatest Festival successes in recent seasons.

But a couple of other Festival regulars will be back again bidding to add to excellent records at the meeting. 2021 Gold Cup winner Minella Indo, with two wins and two seconds from five Festival appearances, is a leading contender for the Cross Country Chase this year after coming out best at the weights when fourth in a handicap on his debut in that discipline in December. Envoi Allen won at the Festival for a third time when successful in last year’s Ryanair Chase and is among the favourites to stage a repeat while 2023 Grand Annual winner Maskada is another who could bid for back-to-back successes.

Bob Olinger won the Baring Bingham in the Robcour colours in 2021 and the same connections have another likely type for the race with Slade Steel whose chances would be enhanced if his Leopardstown conqueror Ballyburn went for the Supreme instead. Elsewhere, a couple of the stable’s best chances lie in the novice chases, with former Triumph Hurdle winner Quilixios and Monty’s Star both promising last-time-out winners and possibles for the Arkle and Brown Advisory respectively.

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