It’s an oft-touted truism that the results of last year’s Cheltenham Festival races are often the best place to start when looking for winners at the upcoming edition and nowhere is this more true than in the handicaps.
Betzone have gone non-runner-no-bet on all the weight-for-ratings races at Prestbury Park and we’ve flagged a couple of big-priced selections that are nicely handicapped to repeat, or even improve upon, their bold efforts 12 months ago.
Best bets for the Cheltenham Handicaps
Straw Fan Jack to win the Festival Plate @ 33/1 each-way
Pied Piper to win the County Hurdle @ 25/1 each-way
Bet on every Cheltenham Festival race at Betzone
Odds disparity between return Plate plotters hard to fathom
At the time of writing Crebilly is 15/2 second favourite for the Festival Plate behind only fellow Jonjo-and-AJ-O’Neill-trained and JP-McManus owned stablemate Jagwar.
The latter is a shorter price for the Jack Richards Novices’ Chase earlier on Festival Thursday, which makes Crebilly de-facto market leader. It’s easy enough to see why. A close second in last year’s race off 140, he returns for what has doubtless been his target ever since off 138.
What’s less easy to fathom is the price differential between the O’Neill animal and Straw Fan Jack, who is 33/1 non-runner-no-bet despite finishing just a neck behind him in the 2024 running of 133.
Returning this year off 6lbs lower Sheila Lewis’ stable star would have a cracking each-way chance if sneaking in at the bottom of the weights and stands a decent chance of doing so thanks to so many Plate entrants also having entries in the Jack Richards.
Tip: Straw Fan Jack to win the Festival Plate @ 33/1 each-way
County Hurdle standing dish lurking on a dangerous mark
Pied Piper has placed second and third off marks of 154 and 156 in the last two runnings of the County Hurdle but there’s still some 25/1 available about him winning the 2025 edition.
Attempting to make it third time lucky off a rating of 154 looks a very reasonable ask, given he was beaten just a head of that figure when carrying 11st 13lbs in 2023.
Still only seven, the former Grade 1 winning juvenile has repeatedly shown his aptitude for the frantic, big-field County Test.
His form since last year’s Festival run is nothing to shout about, but that shouldn’t stop him making another bold bid, especially if Gordon Elliot brings in a conditional jockey to lessen his burden as he did last year when Pied Piper flew home late under 3lb claimer Danny Gilligan.
