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Paul Townend

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Born in Midleton, County Cork on September 15, 1990, Paul Townend became stable jockey to Willie Mullins at Closutton, County Carlow following the retirement of Ruby Walsh on May 1, 2019. That season he won his second Irish jump jockeys’ title, having won his first, aged just 20, in 2010/11. Indeed, following his promotion, he would retain his title for the next four seasons running.

As far as the Cheltenham Festival is concerned, Townend rode his first winner, What A Charm, trained by Arthur Moore, in the Fred Winter Juvenile Handicap Hurdle in 2011. He has since increased his career tally to 34 winners and won each of the four ‘feature’ races – the Champion Hurdle, Queen Mother Champion Chase, Stayers’ Hurdle and Cheltenham Gold Cup – at least once.

Townend has the distinction of winning the ‘Blue Riband’ event, the Cheltenham Gold Cup, four times, twice on Al Boum Photo (2019 and 2020) and twice on Galopin Des Champs (2023 and 2024). Those wins represent a welcome change of fortune for Mullins, who, prior to 2019, had saddled the runner-up in the Cheltenham Gold Cup on six occasions. Of course, the future could be brighter still for Mullins, Townend and Galopin Des Champs who, at the time of writing, is top-priced 6/4 favourite to become the first horse since Best Mate, in 2004, to win the Cheltenham Gold Cup three years running.

Townend has won the Queen Mother Chase twice, on Energumene (2022 and 2023), and the Champion Hurdle and Stayers’ Hurdle once apiece, on State Man (2024) and Penhill (2018), respectively. He was also won the County Hurdle four times, the Arkle Challenge Trophy and the Triumph Hurdle three times apiece and the Ryanair Chase twice. Indeed, in 2020, 2022 and 2023, Townend won the Ruby Walsh Trophy, awarded to the leading jockey at the Cheltenham Festival, having ridden five winners over the four days on each occasion.

Henrietta Knight

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In November 2023, Henrietta Knight announced that, after an 11-year hiatus, she would be returning to training at West Lockinge, near Wantage, Oxfordshire, from whence she had previously sent out over 700 winners. She duly enjoyed her first winner since returning to the training ranks, Motazzen, in a handicap hurdle at Fontwell on December 10, 2024.

Formerly a successful point-to-point trainer, Knight first began training under Rules in 1989. Nowadays, she is assisted by former Grand National winning-jockey Brendan Powell Snr. (also a highly successful trainer in his own right), but was previously assisted by her late husband, Terry Biddlecombe, whom she married in 1995. Champion National Hunt Jockey in 1965, 1966 and 1969, Biddlecombe suffered a stroke in October 2011 and Knight handed in her licence to take care of him.

Biddlecombe died in January 2014 but, during their time together, the original ‘odd’ couple enjoyed numerous high-profile successes. Most notable of their achievements was their handling of Best Mate, owned by Jim Lewis, whom they saddled to win 14 of his 22 races between November 1999 and November 2005, including the Cheltenham Gold Cup three years running in 2002, 2003 and 2004. Indeed, ahead of her return to training, Knight said, “Cheltenham’s where I love and I can’t wait to get back there. The emphasis will be on trying to find a few chasers to take me back to Cheltenham.”

Now 78, it remains to be seen if Knight can hit her previous heights at the Cheltenham Festival, where, Best Mate aside, she has a handful of winners to her name. Another horse owned by Jim Lewis, Edredon Bleu, added two to her career tally, courtesy of victories in the Grand Annual Chase in 1998 and the Queen Mother Champion Chase in 2000, on both occasions under A.P. McCoy. She also won the Stayers’ Hurdle with Karshi in 1997 and the Royal & SunAlliance Chase with Lord Noelie in 2000.

Galopin Des Champs

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Owned by Audrey Turley and trained by Willie Mullins in Closutton, Muine Bheag, County Carlow, Galopin Des Champs has been hailed by David Jennings of the ‘Racing Post’ as ‘the greatest staying chaser of his generation’. Still only a nine-year-old, the grandson of top National Hunt sire Sholokhov has, at the time of writing, won 13 of his 21 races over hurdles and fences, the most recent of which was an impressive seven-and-a-half-length victory over stable companion Fact To File in the Savills Chase at Leopardstown on December 28, 2024.

As far as the Cheltenham Festival is concerned, Galopin Des Champs already has three wins to his name and is desperately unlucky not to have four, having come to grief at the final fence in the Golden Miller Novices’ Chase in 2022 when 12 lengths ahead of his nearest pursuer, Bob Olinger. Prior to that mishap, Galopin Des Champs had opened his account at Prestbury Park with a ready, two-and-a-quarter-length victory over Langer Dan in the Martin Pipe Conditional Jockeys’ Handicap Hurdle in 2021.

After three more victories over fences, all at Grade 1 level and all at long-odds on, Galopin Des Champs was sent off favourite for his first attempt in the Cheltenham Gold Cup. He had little difficulty in justifying his market position, keeping on strongly on the run-in to win by 7 lengths, going away, from the King George VI Chase winner, Bravemansgame. In 2024, Galopin Des Champs defended his Gold Cup title, at a shade of odds-on, successfully avoiding the riderless Fastorslow on the run-in to beat Gerri Colombe by three-and-a-half lengths. Mullins said afterwards that the performance put Galopin Des Champs in the ‘superstar category’ and, granted that he has already achieved a Timeform rating of 181 – just 1lb inferior to the likes of Kicking King, Best Mate and See More Business, to name but three – few would argue.

J.P. McManus

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J.P. McManus, or John Patrick McManus to give him his full name, is one of the richest people in Ireland, with an estimated net worth of over €2 billion. He is also the predominant owner in National Hunt racing and, at the time of writing, leads the 2024/25 Jump Owners Championship with 43 winners from 203 runners, at a strike rate of 21%, and nearly £634,000 in prize money.

McManus is also, by the proverbial country mile, the most successful owner in the history of the Cheltenham Festival. By his own admission, McManus was drawn into horse racing by gambling and his success in the betting ring led him to be dubbed ‘The Sundance Kid’ by Scottish sports journalist Hugh McIlvanney. His first Cheltenham Festival winner, Mister Donovan, trained by Edward O’Grady, in the Baring Bingham Novices’ Hurdle, came back in 1982, but his distinctive green and gold colours have since been carried to victory at the March showpiece on another 77 occasions.

Indeed, McManus is the most successful owner in the history of the Champion Hurdle, with

nine winners, including Istabraq (1998, 1999 and 2000) and Buveur D’Air (2017 and 2018). In 2017, Buveur D’Air and My Tent Or Yours completed a one-two for McManus in the two-mile hurdling championship, thereby making him the first owner in the history of the Cheltenham Festival to reach the landmark of 50 winners.

Of the other feature races, the Queen Mother Champion Chase remains a notable omission from his CV, but McManus has won the Stayers’ Hurdle three times, with Baracouda (2002 and 2003) and More Of That (2014) and the Cheltenham Gold Cup once, with Synchronised (2012). Nevertheless, with a band of exciting, young steeplechasers at his disposal, including Fact To File, Inothewayurthinkin and Corbetts Cross, to name but three, further Festival successes are surely just a matter of time.

Willie Mullins

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Given the dominance of Irish trainers at the Cheltenham Festival in the last decade or so, it is nigh on impossible to refer to the biggest four days of the jumps season without mentioning Willie Mullins. Based in Closutton, Muine Bheag, County Carlow, Mullins enjoys the patronage of most of the leading owners in Ireland, in some cases exclusively, and it is no real surprise that he has been the perennial champion trainer in the Emerald Isle since 2008.

March 14, 2025 – which, coincidentally, is Cheltenham Gold Cup Day – marks the thirtieth anniversary of Mullins’ first winner at the Cheltenham Festival, Tourist Attraction, ridden by Mark Dwyer, in the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle. The Master of Closutton has long since become the force majeure at ‘The Olympics of Horse Racing’; on March 13, 2024, Mullins reached the landmark of 100 Festival winners when Jasmin De Vaux, ridden, fittingly, by his son and assitant trainer, Patrick, won the Weatherbys Champion Bumper . He subsequently saddled two more winners, Absurde in the County Hurdle and Galopin Des Champs in the Cheltenham Gold Cup, to take his career total to 103.

Galopin Des Champs was, of course, defending his Gold Cup title and took Mullins’ tally in the ‘Blue Riband’ event to four, after another back-to-back winner, Al Boum Photo, in 2019 and 2020. Mullins has won the Champion Hurdle five times, with Hurricane Fly (2011 and 2013), Faugheen (2015), Annie Power (2016) and State Man (2024), the Queen Mother Champion Chase twice, with Energumene (2022 and 2023), and the Stayers’ Hurdle twice, with Nichols Canyon (2017) and Penhill (2018). He has also farmed several other races, not least the aforementioned Weatherbys Champion Bumper, in which he has saddled an eye-watering 13 winners down the years, and the Supreme Novices’ Hurdle and County Handicap Hurdle, in which he has saddled seven winners apiece.

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