Coral Cup Betting

The Coral Cup is a Grade 3 race that takes place on the second day of the Cheltenham Festival each year. The race is roughly two and a half miles in length and has a total of ten fences along the distance.

The race traditionally follows the Queen Mother Champion Chase on the second day but still has a healthy prize purse of roughly £75,000 available to the winners and placed horses in the race.

History of the Coral Cup

The history of the Coral Cup betting is actually quite short as the race was only started in 1993 as a race card filler for the festival. The history of the Coral Cup has only ever seen the race have one sponsor, the popular betting chain Coral.

The Coral Cup betting increased in significance six years after it was first raced. In 1999 the race was given Grade 3 status which made it a more important race at the Cheltenham Festival. This decision was made to ensure that competition would still be fierce following the Queen Mother Champion Chase.

The foot and mouth crisis of 2001 is the only time the race has been called off in the history of the Coral Cup.

Cheltenham Festival Records

The Coral Cup is the background for a number of Cheltenham Festival records that are as prestigious as any other records at the festival. Amazingly every single winner of the race holds the Coral Cup record for top horse as no horse has won the race more than once.

The Cheltenham Festival record for top jockey in the race goes to Barry Geraghty who rode Skyís The Limit to a win in 2006 and Spirit River in 2010. Martin Pipe holds one of the Cheltenham Festival records for most successful trainer with three wins in this race; Olympian in 1993, Big Strand in 1997 and Ilnamar in 2002.

Cheltenham Festival Handicap Races

The Coral Cup Betting is one of the popular Cheltenham Festival handicap races. The reason that Cheltenham Festival handicap races are so popular is because the handicaps used are a way of making the races fairer and thus more exciting.

This increases viewing pleasure for the Cheltenham crowds who bet on the race. Cheltenham Festival handicap races work where the better or higher quality horses in a race are forced to carry extra weight. All horses have to carry the same weight and in an ideal world all the horses would finish at exactly the same time.

Coral Cup Sponsorship

Coral Cup betting has always been fast paced and frantic because the race is sponsored by a leading bookmaker. This means advertising of the Coral Cup in the build up to the festival is greater because Coral has more reason to promote its own race.

Coral Cup betting is well known within gambling communities as being one of the races at the Cheltenham Festival where a high number of free bets and special offers are released for punters to use before the Coral Cup takes place.