Inside Sport: Cheltenham Festival

The first month of Spring is a rejuvenating time of year for many of us. The dark winter months are behind us and lighter, brighter times are just around the corner. Perhaps more importantly to some, March also brings one of the biggest British sporting events of the year: the Cheltenham Festival. The National Hunt racing’s showpiece event will feature 28 races spread across four exhilarating days of action from Tuesday 10 March to Friday 13 March, with the best of the action free to view on ITV.

The iconic Cheltenham Racecourse, based in the heart of Gloucestershire, has a slightly reduced capacity of 66,000 this year to hopefully enhance the spectator experience on the busiest days. In 2025, there were 218,000 punters in attendance over the four days, which continued a downward trend from 2022. Racegoers highlighted the rising costs of accommodation, travel, race tickets, food and drink as significant factors. Despite the lower figures in March 2025, a subsequent record-breaking crowd at the 2026 New Year’s Day meeting (44,151) indicated a potentially strong resurgence for the festival. With an estimated 265,000 pints due to be sold, the event organisers have generously brought the prices down by 30p per pint to £7.50, which matches the prices of 2022.

Each of the four days features a championship Grade 1 race bringing together the best horses from Britain and Ireland, culminating with the Cheltenham Gold Cup on Friday. Trainers often enter horses into a few races at the meeting, keeping a close eye on the March rainfall and course conditions until as late as possible.

Ante-post preview

Champion Hurdle 

(2 miles and 87 yards with eight hurdles) – Tuesday 4pm

The elite race on day one has been blown wide open due to the absence of Nicky Henderson’s Sir Gino through injury and Constitution Hill’s erratic jumping. The latter, which romped home in 2023 by nine-and-a-half lengths, missed the festival in 2024 through illness and dramatically fell in 2025 when starting as the odds-on favourite. Has a win on the flat in February restored some confidence, or are the memories of three consecutive major errors in 2025 engrained too deep in his memory? Record-breaking trainer Willie Mullins is hoping to take advantage with his mare Lossiemouth, should he choose this over the Mares’ Hurdle on Thursday. The talented New Lion for Dan Skelton won’t be far away if the shorter distance suits. When others fell last year, Golden Ace took his chance to steal victory at 25-1.

Champion Chase 

(2 miles and 13 fences) Wednesday 4pm

The Irish could have a stranglehold on the market this year. Twelve months ago, Marine National for Kildare-based Barry Connell – won this prestigious chase, his second festival victory, so he clearly has the course form. However, he was beaten by 19 lengths by the impressive JP McManus-owned Majbor-ough at the Dublin Racing Festival in February. The Mullins-trained Il Etait Temps was too good for Nicky Henderson’s Jonbon at Sandown in December, although Jonbon got his revenge at Ascot in January; after so often being the bridesmaid at previous festivals, there would not be a more popular winner all week. Dan Skelton’s L’Eau du Sud was too hot for Jonbon over this course and distance in the Shloer Chase in November.

Stayers’ Hurdle 

(3 miles, 12 hurdles) Thursday 3.20pm

All eyes will be on the colours of the Robcour team, with owner Bryan Acheson fielding last year’s winner Bob Ollinger, trained by Ireland’s Henry de Bromhead, who boasts a fine festival record. Bob Ollinger is a proven stayer, although his age (11) must now be a factor. Teahupoo is likely to top the market for Acheson, having won this in 2024 and finishing second in 2025; the Gordon Elliott-trained mare’s seven-length victory over Bob Ollinger at Leopards-town can’t be ignored. If you prefer youth over experience, then the up-and-coming horse in the field is the six-year-old Honesty Policy for JP McManus, who also runs Impose Toi in his green and gold hooped silks. 

Gold Cup 

(3 miles and two-and-a-half furlongs, 22 fences) 

Friday 4pm

The blue-riband race of the week, and the most prestigious in jump racing, is wide open this year and expected to be a classic. Galopin Des Champs will again attempt to win a remarkable third Gold Cup, although no 10-year-old has managed this since 1998. The former champion in 2023 and 2024 finished behind the current bookies’ favourite, Fact To File, and Gaelic Warrior at the Irish Gold Cup in February. Pipping Galopin to the post in 2025 was Inothewayurthinkin, although Gavin Cromwell’s eight-year-old has not looked the same horse this season. Jango Bai for Henderson has all the credentials and proven course form after his Arkle success here 12 months ago. The Juke Box Man is likely to start as one of the favourites after his King George success on Boxing Day at Kempton; his jumping is also better suited to Cheltenham. 

Once Upon A Time

In this new feature, we delve into how different sports were born

Football in its current format arrived in the middle of the 19th century, but various versions of the game date back further than you may think.

As long ago as the second and third centuries BC, the Chinese played a game called cuju, which was the first known team game that involved kicking a ball. In one version, it was said that the gameplay consisted of teammates passing to each other without the ball being allowed to touch the ground – a bit like ‘keepie-uppie’. The ball, which was stitched leather filled with feathers or fur, was passed around with the aim of being kicked through a circular hole in a net stretched between poles. 

Cuju is recognised by FIFA as the earliest form of football. By 600AD, a version of the game called kemari had reached Japan and was played in the imperial court in Kyoto.

The ancient Greeks and Romans in the first century BC are said to have played many ball games in public that were often brutal, some of which involved using their feet. Harpastum was like football or rugby. The Roman politician Cicero recorded a case where a player was killed in a barber shop; the unfortunate incident occurred when a player threw the ball to a barber whilst he was holding a razor to a customer’s throat.

Throughout Europe, the Middle Ages saw a huge rise in the popularity of the annual Shrovetide football matches, particularly in England. An early reference from the 9th century describes ‘a party of boys playing ball’. Often referred to as ‘mob football’, this would be played between towns, and neighbouring villages participated with an unlimited number of players ‘en masse’. The object of the game would be to move the pig’s bladder of a ball between chosen geographical points, often parishes.

Sports bites

Football

The first chance to pick up some silverware this season will be on Sunday 22 March when Arsenal take on Manchester City in the Carabao Cup Final, which is live on ITV at 4.30pm. It’s somewhat fitting that the two best teams fighting for the Premier League title come head-to-head at Wembley. Manager Mikel Arteta is desperate to win a second trophy for the Gunners since their FA Cup victory in 2020. 

Motor Racing 

It’s “lights out and away we go” as the new season of Formula 1 gets underway with the first three rounds of the championship. The lights go out in Australia on the weekend of 6–8 March, followed by Round 2 in China, 13-15 March, and Round 3 in Japan, 27-29 March. Can Lando Norris defend his title in what was a dominant McLaren performance in 2025? With pre-season testing underway, the talk in the pitlane is that fellow Briton George Russell’s Mercedes team are the ones to watch. New to the grid is an extra team in Cadillac and a team from Audi (formerly Sauber).