UK Horse Racing Tips

With the prestigious 2018 Cheltenham Festival now only a stone’s throw away the bookmaker odds and red top newspaper chatter has already started focusing on who they think this year’s ‘stand out’s might be (no pun!). Might Bite is heavily favoured at just 3-1 to win this year’s Cheltenham Gold Cup with last year’s victor Sizing John also in the running. Of course there may well still be a few changes to the line ups, as one or two fancied horses have already dropped out from this and other Cheltenham races. That’s always important to factor that in, especially if you opt to place an early bet on this or any other race with a potentially large field.

Betting on big horse racing events like the Cheltenham Festival, Royal Ascot or the Grand National can often be a different skill / art than your typical day to day betting. With the Cheltenham Festival just around the corner it’s worth looking out for the latest Cheltenham betting odds for the 2018 festival.  These events are often highly competitive and in my opinion fewer horses slip under the radar (as can more readily happen in day to day betting, where sometimes people get rather gungho on the betting markets without really knowing a lot about what they’re laying or betting on). Weighing up the pros and cons of what to place your money on can be a trickier affair than usual.

That’s not to say there aren’t significant betting opportunities out there. The Cheltenham Gold Cup and other races at the festival have seen huge priced winners over the years and that’s just with bookmakers odds, rather than the betting exchanges. Norton’s Coin is perhaps the name that would first role off the tongue when thinking of Cheltenham betting opportunities of old. He won the Gold Cup at 100-1, then there’s Hardy Eustace winning the 2004 Champion Hurdle at 33-1, Western Warhorse winning the 2014 Arkle Challenge trophy, the list goes on! Sometimes looking for a big priced bet can be a perfectly valid option. Let’s not forget that Hove bookmaker Ben Keith took a £375,000 win bet on Willie Mullins Douvan in the 2017 Queen Mother Champion Chase, only for it to disappoint at odds of 2-9. A betting nightmare for one odds-on loving punter.

So who will be the stand outs of the 2018 Cheltenham Festival I wonder, and are there any horses in particular you’ve had your eye on. I’m naturally inclined to sometimes look beyond the favourites in the betting when I’m approaching races that have one too many unknowns for my liking, which can be true as I’ve said of the big Festivals. There will of course be long and short odds opportunities to bet on over the four day Festival and we’ll be analysing many potential selections from favourites to outsiders closer to the start of this prestigious event which in 2018 starts on 13^th March and ends on 16^th day of the month.

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