Cheltenham Festival 2021

The Cheltenham festival in 2021 will begin on Tuesday, March 16 and finish on Friday, March 19.

Day one will feature seven races, with the Unibet Champion Hurdle at 3:30pm as the feature race.

On day two, the Betway Queen Mother Champion Chase headlines another seven-race card.

There are two feature races on day three as part of the seven-race offering. The Ryanair Chase is followed by the Paddy Power Stayers' Hurdle.

The prestigious Cheltenham Gold Cup takes place on the final day of the festival at 3:30pm - and there is a £625,000 prize pot as the best chasers in Britain and Ireland battle it out.

As always, there will be plenty of Cheltenham free bets and betting offers around the event, and you can find them all on Bookies Bonuses.

Cheltenham Festival is the ultimate Jump racing event in the UK. It is home to many of the biggest and best races each year, with 265,000 fans in attendance across the four days.

There is an enormous amount of money wagered during Cheltenham Festival, with the event - rather like the Grand National - attracting the casual bettors as well as the experienced ones. It is relatively common for punters that usually wager on other sports to claim Cheltenham free bets and get involved with horse racing for the week.

With origins dating back to 1860, the event is steeped in history and loved not only for the world-class racing action but also the atmosphere, and notably the 'Cheltenham roar'.

Cheltenham Racecourse is situated at Prestbury Park in Gloucestershire. It’s an idyllic setting, nestled at the base of the Cotswold Hills.

The racecourse consists of both the Old Course and a New Course that sits alongside it. 

The New Course has a downhill fence and a longer-run than the Old Course. There is also a cross-country course that is only used for cross-country steeplechases.

Aside from the festival, there is a full calendar of race meetings at Cheltenham, including the Jump season curtain-raiser in October, called The Showcase. Music, comedy, and other events also take place there.

Cheltenham Festival is one of the best times of the year if you are someone that loves betting offers. Because so many general sports fans and bettors like to have a punt at Cheltenham, the UK betting sites find themselves competing with one another and the best way to get the upper hand is to offer Cheltenham free bets as well as other special betting deals.

Many of the Cheltenham betting offers are for new customers, but a large chunk of them are for existing players too. So, just because you already have an account with the biggest and most popular betting sites such as Betfair and Bet365, that doesn't mean you won't be able to claim offers from those particular online bookmakers.

Betting companies are constantly coming up with new, lucrative and creative Cheltenham Festival promotions, but below are the most common ones.

Cheltenham Betting Offers 2021

• Cheltenham free bets

Free bet offers are in abundance all year round, but during Cheltenham, they are ramped up even more. Expect promotions such as Bet £10 Get £30 to be among the main betting sign up offers throughout Cheltenham.

• Enhanced odds

Another one of the more common Cheltenham betting offers is price boosts or enhanced odds. The usual formula is that you will get an odds-on favourite at massive odds such as 40/1, with limited stakes only and extra winnings paid in Cheltenham free bets. The best betting sites will also offer plenty of enhanced odds to existing customers throughout the week.

• Money back specials

Some betting sites offer money back if your horse falls, or if it finishes second. Other stipulations pop up on various sites, and your returned stake could be credited as cash or in Cheltenham free bets.

• Best Odds Guaranteed

This means that if you back a horse at the fixed odds offered and the starting price ends up being bigger, you will get paid out at the greater odds if your bet is a winner. The best B.O.G Cheltenham promotions include bets that are placed as early in the morning as possible or, even better, the day before.

• Non-Runner No Bet

If you like to place ante-post wagers in advance of a race, the non-runner no bet Cheltenham promotion gives you the added security of a returned stake if the horse does not take part in the race.

• Deposit Bonus

While most betting sign up offers throughout the festival involve Cheltenham free bets, a number of bookmakers offer a deposit bonus instead, meaning that they matched your first deposit up to a certain amount.

• Extra places

Existing players can benefit from extra place Cheltenham betting offers, and with these promotions, you get paid out if your horse finishes in, for example, the top six, instead of the usual top four in a 16+ runner race.

What better for a traditional British and Irish racing event than some classic cold, damp weather to go with it. The average for that time of year is around 6 to 11 degrees and rain is common. Don’t worry about the thousands of attendees - they’ll be nicely wrapped up in their alcohol jacket.

We will keep this page updated nearer the time, but do watch the forecast carefully, as the weather will play a huge part in each horse's performance.

The most recent postponement at the Cheltenham Festival came in 2008 due to strong winds on day two.

When betting on Cheltenham, it is important to take in as much information as possible. Simply checking whether or not a horse won on its last outing will not suffice when there are so many other factors to consider, such as;

1. Going - What is the surface like on the day, and how will this affect each of the runners?
2. Connections - How have other horses from the same stable been faring as of late? Are there any owner, trainer or jockey combinations to look out for?
3. Distance - Is the horse proven over this race distance? Will stamina be an issue?
4. Course Form - It is always beneficial if the horse has had good results at Cheltenham before.

Remember, you don't have to bet on every single race. Sometimes, you won't be able to find value, and it is best to just leave it and take learnings from the race without a financial interest. Or, you might go for an alternative market such as a match bet, betting without the favourite, or a forecast/tricast.

How to bet on Cheltenham

• Win - The simplest type of bet is to back a particular horse to win. This type of bet is also known as on the nose.
• Place - With place betting, you are backing the horse not necessarily to win, but to finish in the top two, three, four, or even more depending on the terms offered. Standard place terms are two places for 5-7 runners, three places for more than 8 runners, and four places for more than 16 runners.
• Each-way - This is a combination of a win bet and a place bet - so £10 each-way means a £10 bet on a win and a £10 bet on a place bet. If your horse wins, both bets are successful. If your horse is placed, only the second part of the bet will provide a payout. One of the main Cheltenham promotions offered by betting sites is extra places, so you might get five places on a certain 11-horse race rather than the usual three places.
• Forecast - Also known as an Exacta bet, this is where you predict which exact horses will come in 1st and 2nd. So, for example, a £10 bet on horse 2 and horse 4 will mean that horse 2 will have to come first and horse 4 will have to come second in order for you to win.
• Reverse Forecast - They call this a Quinella bet in some countries, and this similar to a Forecast in that you are predicting the first two spots, but in this instance, it can be in any order. This means that you can name two horses that need to come in the top two spots, and you do not need to get the right order. So, for example, a £10 bet on horses 2 and 4 will pay out if both horses make the first two spots.
• Tricast - To win a Tricast, otherwise called a Trifecta, you need to predict the exact order of the first three spots in a race. So, for example, you place a wager on horse 3 to finish 1st, horse 5 to finish 2nd and horse 6 to finish 3rd. All these horses need to finish in that exact order for you to win.
• Match bets - If you think one horse will finish ahead of another, you can just go for a match bet which is available on some betting sites. With match bets, it doesn't matter if they come in 1st and 2nd respectively or 5th and 6th - as long as your chosen horse beats the other, you win.
• Betting without - The best horse racing betting sites have betting without the favourite markets. This is particularly useful if there is a short price favourite that you believe will win, but you want to back another horse to do well.
• Insure bet - This is essentially a Win bet, but you get your money back if it places. You can sometimes choose how many places you get your money back for, but the odds shorten as you increase this.